For Tony

Around this time last week, I sat in the lobby of the Rocky Gap Casino and Resort, staring across Lake Habeeb, sipping on my latte with a cheerfully made heart by the friendly bartender, and listening to the bells and whistles of the slot machines a few yards away. I had no idea that later that night I would be having one of the best meals of my life (so far).

Around this time three years ago, the world was still freshly mourning the loss of culinary bad boy Anthony Bourdain. I knew the name, I knew the shows, I didn’t know his whole story. I had seen a handful of episodes of Parts Unknown, and I enjoyed it. The older I get and the more I learn about him the more I mourn his loss. My posthumously developed love for the man makes it that much more poignant.

I’ve been listening to Kitchen Confidential, read by the man himself. It’s been on my list for awhile, but I think something in the back of my mind kept me from being ready to open it. Maybe it was my own struggles with mental health and suicidal ideations that kept me from Kitchen Confidential for so long, but now that my mind is more at ease I felt ready for it.

Spoiler alert, I wasn’t.

I knew he had his demons, but holy shit hearing him recount his youth with such candor breaks my heart with every passing chapter.

A teeny part of me has always wanted to work in a professional kitchen, but I also know far too much about the culinary underbelly that screams “Caroline Winter cannot handle this shit”. And I own up to that. A professional kitchen of any sort is rife with stress, abuse, harassment, drug use, addiction, debauchery…I knew all of that already. All that knowledge has done is instill in me an immense amount of respect for anyone who can stand up to that, sociopathic tendencies aside.

Which leads me to the meal in question.

The Lakeside Grille has a small menu by many standards. I had been to nice restaurants before, but this was fine dining. I was intimidated to say the least. I saw a Wagyu smash burger and I was tempted, but I knew that Wagyu beef should be treated much better than that.

I’ve never liked mushrooms. Something about them just skeeves me out a little bit. I admire fungus for its role in nature, but eating it? Ehhhh that’s a bit much for me. But the only thing I saw on the menu that night that I could maybe be in the mood for (my brain was being stupid) was braised short rib with house-made cavatelli, wild mushrooms, and fresh herbs.

Just a few days before I had listened to Bourdain read a passage about the day he was the only one in his family to try an oyster fresh from the ocean floor, and how from that moment on he made it a goal of his to try as many foods as possible. He later mentioned his first meal that he really noticed, as a fourth grader on a trans-Atlantic cruise to France; vichyssoise, a cold leek and potato soup.

Fuck it, I decided to live in the spirit of the oyster boy and try something out of my comfort zone, as I had a couple of weeks prior when trying mussels for the first time during a cooking class my family took at Baltimore Chef Shop. Got a side of fancy green beans just in case I needed something more palatable.

Absolutely zero regrets. Didn’t need the green beans either, although they were pretty fuckin’ delicious, too.

The meat was the most tender thing I had ever eaten, the mushrooms were succulent (a word which I never in my life would use to describe edible fungus), the herbs kicking up the levels of savory to heights unknown. All of it swimming in what I can only assume to be demi glace based sauce. From the first bite I was in fucking heaven. The green beans were, as much as I hate the phrase, tender-crisp and expertly seasoned with garlic, ginger, and soy sauce.

I’ve eaten food, obviously. Wouldn’t have made it to 26 without it. I’ve had a lot of good food, too. But this meal…this was art. The kind of food where a bite makes your eyes roll back in your head as you savor every morsel. Was this what young Tony felt like? I don’t know, but I know what I felt. And I loved every second.

I couldn’t finish the whole plate, but I would have stuffed myself to bursting if I didn’t want to save room for dessert; crème brûlée. I think it had been left in expo just a minute too long as the bottom portion had warmed and melted in a way (the only disappointing part of the meal), but gods it was the creamiest, most delicately flavored dessert I’ve ever had. The sugar on top was torched to perfection, and I got a deep satisfaction out of cracking the top before digging in.

I still have a little tinge of regret for not sending my compliments back to the kitchen when we were done. I think we were a little busy talking about how we wanted to get over to the Signatures bar to say hi to our friendly waitress from the night before, who turned out to have called out anyway.

As we went back to our room, bellies full, all I could think about was Anthony Bourdain. Why? Fuck if I know, but the man and the meal have been on my mind for the past week, and I decided I had to write out this…post…blog…journal…whatever the fuck this is.

It’s been a minute since I posted anything on this little passion project of mine. I had a health scare and a litter of kittens to contend with, and my passions fell to the back burner.

But they’re back now, baby, and boy do I have plans. I’m hesitant to put them in writing just yet, but I don’t want to live the rest of my life letting time idly pass by while missing out on new experiences, even if I have to literally make them myself. I mentioned in my last post (like five months ago lol) what food and cooking for people means to me, and I still stand by that. I always will. But I think I have an additional reason to pursue the passion now. For the love of food, people, and the human condition. For Saint Anthony the Opinionated, who never balked at a challenge and knew exactly who he was up until the end.

I have a plethora of cookbooks and the internet is my figurative and literal oyster when it comes to trying new recipes. I made horchata for the first time the other day and died and went to cinnamon-vanilla heaven. I want to fry up some mushrooms myself and toss them with a nice risotto, standing over a hot stove for thirty minutes be damned. I want to make gazpacho with tomatoes fresh from my own garden, even though I don’t even like tomatoes. I want to roast a duck again, maybe even try venison or hell, I know where I can get ethically-farmed rabbit. I want to learn about cultures and foods so different from my own that they feel alien at first glance. And I want to send my compliments to the kitchen way more often.

Oh hey look, I put it in writing.