#BourdainDay: Celebrating the man but not really.
Part one of a multi-part series on my recent #Bourdainday dinner party.
I cannot wait to share with you the tremendous evening that was #BourdainDay, but first, I have to give a massive thank you to my Sister-in-Law, Meredith Ready, who shot all the photos. You can find her at www.meredithreadyphotography.com or on Instagram at @meredithready.photography.
Also, this post doesn’t describe the food. I leave that for another installment. If you want to read about each dish, please visit my next post: Central Europe x Central Texas.
Few voices have been more influential in the food world over the past twenty years than Anthony Bourdain. Most know his television shows, but before that, he was a writer and, before that, a cook.
Since his death, those closest to him have celebrated his life on his birthday, June 25th, in what they call “#BourdainDay.” His famous friends Eric Ripert, or José Andrés, or Mark Ruhlman post a picture or memory of their friend with the hashtag #BourdainDay. It’s a touching tribute to a man whose life not only influenced their own but helped make their entire industry cool. Bourdain was the bad boy/rock star of the culinary world. He was cynical and curious at the same time. He appreciated art but also had no time for bullshit. Is there any surprise that I, too, admired him and am an unequivocal fangirl?
I’ve watched all the shows (even the early A Cooks Tour show) and read most of his written work, including some of his fiction. I remember hearing of his death and feeling as though I had lost a friend. I typically don’t have much of a reaction to celebrity deaths, but this was different. I’m not sure why, but Tony connected with me in ways other celebrities had never.
In the first year of the #BourdainDay hashtag, there was an explicit call to cook with friends and share those meals online. A social media event that has since passed its moment has become an annual tradition in my home. Every year, I host a #BourdainDay event. The only requirement for #BourdainDay is to pay much attention to the food and the drink. As I am the only Bourdain groupie in my friend group, this has also become Taylor’s Holiday.
Over the years, #BourdainDay has varied in its presentation. I have cooked small dinner parties with just a few courses and hosted large mezze platters for groups of friends. This year, I hosted my most ambitious event yet. I wanted to be over the top. I didn’t want to make it easy on myself. This was an opportunity not just to feed my loved ones but show myself how well I could cook. No effort was spared. No detail felt small. The meal consisted of five courses for twelve guests, each individually plated for 60 plates in total. I had on my white apron and strict order in the kitchen. This was my own personal episode of The Bear.
The meal was inspired by a vague sense of “Jewish/Central European/ by way of Central Texas.” A German immigrant tradition influences Hill Country Texas, so it made sense culinarily even if it felt esoteric linguistically.
Menu:
Knish with homemade fixin’‘s
Poached salmon with braised leeks and fennel
Venison Schnitzel with mixed fresh and fermented cabbage and burnt tomatoes
Toast with goat cheese and melon
Fresh butter and local peach galette with my neighor’s fig jam.
My home is too small to host such an event, so my eternally lovely In-Laws hosted it, allowing me to take over their kitchen. THANK GOD to my mother-in-law, whom I’ve already introduced in previous posts, for helping me with plating and made this whole thing possible.
I’ll write a plate-by-plate description in a future post, but today, I’m thinking more of the event than the food.
Prior to the event, I experienced an odd bit of shame and embarrassment about the whole thing. It felt incredibly indulgent to ask 12 people to participate in my restaurant pantomime. This has to be what it’s like for a new comic to ask his/her friends to attend an open mic night. As the performer, you are making yourself and your art vulnerable. As a friend, you don’t want to waste anyone’s time. In both cases, open mic night and my dinner, you just hope there is enough booze so that even if you bomb, everyone still has a good time.
Thankfully, my fears were unwarranted and unnecessary. The event was an unqualified success. The food tasted phenomenal, embodying the flavors imagined in my head. A balance of simple preparations with the wonderful complexity of fermented elements and local sourcing. Everyone in attendance committed to the spirit of the event. They came with open minds, curious palates, and empty stomachs. My brother-in-law confessed to not eating lunch in preparation so that he might have more room for this evening’s dinner. After the meal was complete, and I was starting to clean the kitchen, he stumbled in like the orphan Oliver, asking for some more. Another dear friend even custom-brewed me two different beers to go with the meal, keeping with the meal’s theme.
Plate after plate. People swapped stories, passed the wine, and enjoyed the evening. They loved the food but even more loved being with other guests and having a communal experience. While in the kitchen plating the next course, I would hear waves of laughter coming out of the dining room, followed by brief lulls of silence that told me people were eating the food. And yes, the event was indulgent. Maybe my friends did kindly indulge my ego and hobby, but they also indulged in an incredible meal. It was an indulgence that could only occur with great care. That care transforms mere hedonism into a celebratory act with purpose and value.
A recent theme in my life is learning the power of enthusiasm. Being extra is not cringe. It’s a superpower. Enthusiasm creates fun and joy in the face of the entropy of the human condition. Spend any time reading cultural critique (and if you’re on Substack, I imagine you do a lot of that), and you’ll quickly stumble across high-brow columnists lamenting America’s “atomization” or “lack of third places.” These are just obtuse ways of saying, “People don’t get together as much as they used to.” But is that true? And if it is, why? I’m sure people will blame social media, but we might only have ourselves to blame. Somewhere along the way, we have forgotten that communities are made. They don’t magically appear. Rather, people do the work to create experiences that we all get to share and feel that sense of community. Not only is community a labor of love by those who organize it, but it also requires the work of the participants. You have to show up to experience the joy of community. So I did the work of creating the event (with a lot of help), and my friends did the work of showing up.
I think Bourdain understood that. Each week on No Reservations or Parts Unknown, he shone a light on the people who build communities. He would feature emerging chefs with a new take on old favorites and also their line cooks who actually cook the food catching everyone’s attention. He filmed segments with the mothers, nonnas, and abuelas that feed their whole neighborhood with expert hands and not much money, treating them with the same deference as those aforementioned emerging chefs. He may have been cynical about a great many things in the world, but he was nothing if not enthusiastic about food and its power to create community.
Part of me thinks Anthony Bourdain would hate that I host an annual event in his name. But #BourdainDay has very little to do with Anthony Bourdain, the man, anymore. We didn’t sit around lamenting the loss of a brilliant, if troubled man. We didn’t talk about our favorite episode; we talked about the funny thing our kids did this week or the other mundane joys that characterize life. #BourdainDay has transcended its namesake, becoming a midsummer celebration of friends and food. We come together in the hot Texas summer and do the work of building a joyful evening which serves as just another brick in the work of building a good life. And I do think Tony would like that.