Death to celebrity chefs!!!

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knyfeknerd

Original Knerd of Knives
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I've been thinking about this for quite a long time now, but after flipping through channels last night and actually watching about 5 minutes of "The Taste" last night...............
...........
......ANTHONY BOURDAIN!!!!!! you are such a giant hypocrite!
I'm not gonna lie, Kitchen Confidential is one of the best books ever written. It came to me at the perfect time in my life and inspired me with it's cynicism and realism. I felt like "This guy gets me" That book made me want to work harder for less money and eat my chef's turds every chance I got-for less money!
It's the "Hard work is a reward unto itself" kinda mentality. If you haven't been in the trenches you wouldn't understand. If you haven't been hit in the head with a sautee pan from chef you are a puss and should go hang yourself in shame because you'll never be as badass as us kinda thing.
I've read all his books, even fiction. I've seen a lot of his shows. Not all, I mean I do WORK for a living. But this Shite???!!!???

This is just the tip of the iceberg though. At what point in time do you stop REALLY being a chef and caring about the food at YOUR restaurant(s) and become a jet-setting celebrity?
I see these ads in Bon Apetit with Michael Symon and Marcus Samuelsson eating caviar and drinking ****ing champagne on a GD Gulfstream while being fanned by Mario Batali!!!
Oh yeah, that's not what being a REAL chef is about.
C'mon, let's clean out a greasetrap. Let's work 6 consecutive 20 hour shifts with a 12 hour "light" day on Sunday......For 2 months straight(on a crap salary) Let's sweat completely through our clothes, leather belt and shoes included. Let's chafe our gnad's till they bleed!!!! And then rub some Fler de Sel on them.
That's a chef.



There's much more to come, but who do you hate the most?
Please share and please tell me why.
I'm thinking I'll elaborate on Batali next post........


P.S. Guy Fieri does not count as a chef.
 
I was going to say guy fiero, but you beat me with your very accurate disclaimer
 
I stopped reading your post at this line, and refuse to keep reading until you fix it.

I'm going to lie through my teeth right now and say the "edit post" option has timed out already.......
......I'm eagerly awaiting your response though Vertigo. C'mon who's it gonna be???
Tyler Florence?
Bobby Flay?
Jamie Oliver?
I know how much you love Giada and want to have sloppy "amore" with her!!!
 
Can a home cook chime in? Mario has that ponytail, you'd think somebody would use it as a handle and pull his head out of his butt. "OOOoo! I'm Italian!" No, you're from Seattle. You're a mutt like many Americans. AND your marinara sauce in the jar at the grocery store really, really sucks.
 
Chris,
I have to disagree with you because I think Bourdain realizes that he gave up on being a chef long ago and embraced being a writer/journalist/and just rambing ranter a long time ago. I had this discussion with someone the other day that said he sold out. He didn't sell out because I don't think he really promotes himself as a chef.

However, a lot of the "celebrity" chefs out there have sold out because they still call themselves such and make no effort to continue the craft. I think you hit it on the head with Fieri - total hack. My personal top on the list is Rocco Dispirito.

I am not a pro just a humble homey so maybe I should keep my mouth shut. I have nothing but respect for ya'll though and if I wasn't a CPA I would be in the trenches with ya.
 
I'm going to lie through my teeth right now and say the "edit post" option has timed out already.......
......I'm eagerly awaiting your response though Vertigo. C'mon who's it gonna be???
Tyler Florence?
Bobby Flay?
Jamie Oliver?
I know how much you love Giada and want to have sloppy "amore" with her!!!

Ha! How to decide?! I hate so many of them. Work starts at 4am tomorrow and is followed 11 hours later by a date with a judge, so I have some time to think about it. :jumping2:
 
C'mon, let's clean out a grease trap. Let's work 6 consecutive 20 hour shifts with a 12 hour "light" day on Sunday......For 2 months straight(on a crap salary) Let's sweat completely through our clothes, leather belt and shoes included. Let's chafe our gnad's till they bleed!!!! And then rub some Fler de Sel on them.

Precisely why I will NEVER, EVER, NEVER work in a commercial kitchen EVER, NEVER, EVER again.


OH yeah - watching Mario try to school Eric Ripert is a hoot -
 
Ha! How to decide?! I hate so many of them. Work starts at 4am tomorrow and is followed 11 hours later by a date with a judge, so I have some time to think about it. :jumping2:
Damn, I hope the judge is hot and that she puts out!

Seriously though, I hope court doesn't suck. Best of luck to ya. I've been there before.
 
I've heard from a few different people who ate at Les Halle's during his tenure, and had less than kind things to say. He's a writer who fell into cooking, hacked his way along, and eventually got out. Maybe he's 'been in the trenches' but that doesn't make him any better than any other hack. Just watch him try and cook in any of the episodes of no reservations. He looks incredibly awkward.

I find his writing rather self serving and vitriolic personally. Entertaining occasionally, but rather repetitive(no offense Chris. Opinions are like- well, you know the rest...). He is a fun guy to watch on the tube though. And I bet he'd be great to go on a bender with. Well maybe a couple years ago, anyways. Too famous now...
 
Precisely why I will NEVER, EVER, NEVER work in a commercial kitchen EVER, NEVER, EVER again.


OH yeah - watching Mario try to school Eric Ripert is a hoot -

Never have, and hopefully never will. I'd rather make ten grand less a year doing something I enjoy, over being exploited till I burn out(says the guy with virtually no debt/bills...)
 
Now it comes to what do you mean "celebrity chef"? Keller, Ripert,Robuchon, even Fergus Henderson are celebrity chefs now. Wolfgang Puck, perhaps the first celebrity chef, made his bones for years in the kitchen. Fieri, Ray? yeah, F off. Some of these chefs busted their ass for years working 7 days/16hrs a week shift to make their food and restaurants perfect. Just because the media has taken an interest doesn't mean these people are any less of a cook and good for them for finally having to not be in the kitchen. I think its a myth that anyone with a family to support and an option to make life better, wouldn't take an opportunity to make life better and would foresake that to continue work those hours.
 
I used to like watching Flay, but since I saw him putting Fage yogurt in everything that was too much. I'm sure some of you never cared for him anyway, but I did enjoy his rather simple southwest style cooking...once he became an Iron Chef it's all been downhill. BTW, I don't cook for a living, but have ultimate respect for those who do.
:2cents:
 
tkern, I'm asking at what point do you actually really give up cooking in a restaurant?
No offense, but the day I see ANY of you guys in advertisement in Saveur or B.A. or Food & Wine in a private jet sipping on a mocktail in your MetroStylist designed wardrobe.....I'll hunt you down and smack you with a cast iron pan.
I've got a family to support and would love nothing more than to not work these hours..........
.......but how far would you sell out?
 
Hopefully, a chef passes his responsibility on to the best qualified person. i.e. Thomas Keller w/ Hollingsworth, Ziebold, etc.

What is selling out in the industry? Supporting a line of pans? (Puck) Supporting bullion cubes (Marco pierre white)? Supporting Mac knives (Keller)? Its not like people lives are on the line.

If anyone bases their worth as a cook on what their heros do, its going to fail. Its like Led Zepplin in crysler commercials for musicians.
 
tkern, I'm asking at what point do you actually really give up cooking in a restaurant?
No offense, but the day I see ANY of you guys in advertisement in Saveur or B.A. or Food & Wine in a private jet sipping on a mocktail in your MetroStylist designed wardrobe.....I'll hunt you down and smack you with a cast iron pan.
I've got a family to support and would love nothing more than to not work these hours..........
.......but how far would you sell out?
I like to think I have integrity, and I truly respect integrity, but if offered a large enough check, you would probably have to hunt me down and smack me with a cast iron pan. The extra money and cast iron pan would be bit better than the current situation.
 
'Selling out' is a loaded term. Did Keller sell out when he wrote a book for at home cooks? Did Morimoto sell out when he agreed to do Iron Chef America?
 
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Do we have to be chained to a stove for the rest of our lives 24/7, to maintain a sense of self worth? If someone offered me Flay type money, I'd take it and run. And make the most awesomest at home kitchen ever. And cook when I wanted to. Not because I had to due to monetary concerns. I LOVE FOOD. I typically love cooking. But I'm not a line junkie. I enjoy the creative aspect, learning new techniques, and developing my craft. Sweating over a hectic service just doesn't appeal to me anymore. Probably why I'm into charcuterie, and am moving more and more into an administrative/ prep what I want when I want/ conceptualize ideas role.
 
As someone who did their first local tv cooking spot today..I hope the celeb chef doesn't die out before I get paid, son!
 
Do we have to be chained to a stove for the rest of our lives 24/7, to maintain a sense of self worth? If someone offered me Flay type money, I'd take it and run. And make the most awesomest at home kitchen ever. And cook when I wanted to. Not because I had to due to monetary concerns. I LOVE FOOD. I typically love cooking. But I'm not a line junkie. I enjoy the creative aspect, learning new techniques, and developing my craft. Sweating over a hectic service just doesn't appeal to me anymore. Probably why I'm into charcuterie, and am moving more and more into an administrative/ prep what I want when I want/ conceptualize ideas role.

+1

I now want my tombstone to read: "Killed with a black pan by a man named knyfeknerd" -- and the baby goes to college.
 
if anyone has actually READ any of bourdain's books he openly admids, as many have said; im not a chef, im a writer. cooking is something i have done to pay bills and ive treated it as such. he states that at a critical point in his career he could have done $$ or the craft and he chose $$ and blow/crank and spent the 80's bouncing around and amounting to nothing. in his new book, medium raw, he sais that he sits around and at one point all these high guys admit that at some point you just do it for the money, you do it so someone else can run your flagship restaurant so they can have enough noteriety to go open their own place. you stop doing it for you and you do it for the rest. there is also a part in No reservations las vegas when he talks about the vegs "per se" from T. keller and why he went vegas and Keller said similar things. at some point you either expand at promote the good people with in, or you loose them to their own restaurants and other people waving their dreams in front of them. The U.S. food scene is riddled with it. very few have any real integrity once they get the name and the stuff. so few commit to the craft any more. look at David Chang with 3+ places and food spots. the problem is we all work so hard at some point you just give in to the $ i think.
i'd like to say that if i had my own little place and could pack the house at 95-120 a night and do my own food i would be satisfied and i wouldnt ever expand i would just be happy. but the older i get the more i comporomise. so i cant say either way.

personally. i think i lost faith when Thomas Keller went corporate. i mean Damn. he WAS the 1990's/2k. everyone wanted to be him. he redefined the American chef putting his craft on the line. doing one place. being fully booked. just cooking. just doing it. i mean the list of people who came out of the ORIGINAL french Laundry, guys who treated it like Garduate school and spent 2-4 years are amazing chefs, ive met a great many of them before the time of Bouchon and the publishing of the first french laundry book, then .. bouchon. ... then NYC. .. then ... then. ... then. .... so IDk . you gotta go to sleep at night. you gotta make it work. and its a hard industry. you gotta do your food and make your living and just be happy with that in the end i think. and also we can all cook, and still have lives! its pretty cool that right now you can ACUTALLY make a real good living and make a real GOOD paycheck as an executive chef if thats your end career path goal and you stick to it for a while and STILL have time off and family time. thats something that hasnt been available to past chef generations and i think we are dealing with the transition now.
 
I honestly would rather be just "comfortable" and call the shots. I would have an issue with exploitation.

I would prefer to be the Bernie Worrell of chef's than the Paul Mccartney.
 
Pow!!

[video]http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/digital-shorts/video/update-guy-fieri/1261519/[/video]
 
I honestly would rather be just "comfortable" and call the shots. I would have an issue with exploitation.

I would prefer to be the Bernie Worrell of chef's than the Paul Mccartney.

Oh, and own the real estate!
 
Right now I'd take a frying pan to the head for "comfortable and call the shots" without hesitation.

Is Jon Besh a celebrity? He makes me uneasy when I see him on camera.
 
As someone who did their first local tv cooking spot today..I hope the celeb chef doesn't die out before I get paid, son!
Link to this please! We would all like to critique your performance!

Oh and you other guys are funny.
Which pans are best for bashing people in the head? I think there was a thread about cast iron here somewhere:cookingegg::cookingegg::cookingegg::feedkids::feedkids::feedkids:
 
Death is a pretty harsh sentence -- except for Guy Fieri. As the stature of chefs has risen, the 'chef' term is more abused it seems. Frankly, I like how they added 'celebrity' to it as for me it means things like: 'not a real chef' or 'not a chef anymore'. I've also met my fair share of line cooks who don't give a crap about food, learning their trade, expanding their technique or familiarity with other flavors etc who love to call themselves a chef. They can piss me off too in the right situation.

I mean, is Paul Bocuse a celebrity chef or even a chef any more? He no longer cooks at his restaurant. I love how he was asked one time: "Who cooks the food in your restaurant when you are gone?" His response was: "The same people who cook the food when I am there." If a chef has done their time and are good cooks, I have no problem with them cashing in.

Putting crap shows on TV is another thing, but that is why we have DVRs.

k.
 
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