By Karen
After last season’s debacle in Romania, Anthony Bourdain returns the favor by taking his pal Zamir to Baltimore, Detroit, and Buffalo in the dead of winter. In Baltimore, they feast on cheap fried fish and greens out in the cold on a roadside picnic table.
In Detroit share a Middle Eastern meal with Rashid, a man who was evacuated with Tony and his crew from Beirut. There, Tony also engages in another lame athletic endeavor (compensation for the crazy stunts he no longer does?) — feather bowling.
And in Buffalo, of course, they try – beef on weck? WTF?
Zamir’s always-entertaining presence should make this an episode not to miss.
Found this chat with Mario Batali. Bourdain had just returned from the as-yet-unaired “Meet the Fockers” episode in Sardinia, and asks for advice on how to fit in. He mentions that daughter Ariane already has dual Italian citizenship, and he wants it for himself.
Tomato offers some clips of Bourdain’s latest episode in Melbourne, and at the end provides 7 links to an interview he did with Tony there in 2005 (with some great, youthful-looking photos). Not much new, except Tony totally trashes truffle oil.
Smell My Plate weighs in on celebrity chefs, and draws an insightful conclusion on where Bourdain fits in to that category.
On an side note, way off to the side, NBC must have a death wish. They’re planning a sitcom starring Padma Lakshmi, tentatively called Single Serving. Since Padma’s acting credentials make a list as long as your pinky, Defamer offers some other series ideas for the vapid Top Chef host.
PS: Padma and Tom Colicchio were co-nominated for Emmys for best reality competition hosts. Talk about riding the bald guy’s coat tails.
Cats Working 
You try going through an archive of 800 stories and put in paragraph breaks after WordPress removed them. By the way you haven’t asked permission to use that picture of Anthony Bourdain which is copyright. You should perhaps at least link to the photographer or take it down.
http://www.christinasimons.com/
Welcome, Ed. From your comments, I assume you are the blogger Tomato. As you requested, I’ve deleted the photo of Bourdain, although I did credit the photographer, Christina Simons. And I’m leaving the link to her site in your comments. She’s good.
Sorry to hear about your problems with the returns in WordPress, and I’ve also deleted my snarky comment about them. I have some formatting problems with WordPress myself from time to time, although returns has never been one of them.
I thought your Bourdain interview was great. Not your fault that he didn’t offer much new information. He’s been basically singing the same tunes for several years now, which is understandable, since between his show and his writing his brain has probably been picked clean.
Lately Bourdain seems to be off the personal appearance circuit, and I don’t think new episodes of No Reservations start filming until later in August, so I hope he’s somewhere beautiful, recharging his batteries.
Thanks for checking in!
That’s cool and I don’t mean to be heavy on the pic but it’s not my copyright to give but Christina’s. I’ve gone through and reformatted – thanks for that.
Q: Anyone notice the DulcoLax commercial between segments of No Reservations? My wife pointed that out.
And the former Ms. Salman Rushdie in a sitcom? Aaar! Why not a full bore Bollywood fillum, by gholly ghosh?
So about last night’s show. It was good to see Tony in his well-worn, well-traveled leather jacket again, and having become a Wire junkie, myself, I liked the Baltimore segment the best as I was looking forward to seeing Jay Landsman and Felicia “Snoop” Pearson — the crab and oysters looked good, too. I’m not sure that Zamir brought much to the party, though, although it does seem that he has quite a fan club in Buffalo.
BTW, I won’t be watching Single Serving.
Ed, no problem. We bloggers gotta work together to keep the blogosphere a happy place!
Bosco, I’ll watch out for the DulcoLax commercial when I watch the episode tonight. I hope Padma’s not in it!
Adele, in the little clip I saw from Baltimore, Zamir seemed kind of subdued. I’ll have to see how the rest of the episode goes. Tony probably kept him on a tight leash since they were on home turf. Romania’s one thing, but Bourdain could run into the same people in upstate NY.
FYI, I will be very surprised if ANYBODY watches Single Serving. I just can’t see the woman carrying a sitcom through more than a pilot. Licking hamburger grease off your ankles for a few seconds is one thing, but deliberately making people laugh is something else entirely.
Missing the episodes… But Just checking my mail at the Apple Store West Edmonton Mall. So thought I would pop in and get caught up…
Hi ALL!!!
Bob
Bob, you’re not missing much. I’ve seen the Rust Belt episode, and I think the best parts were left out — when Zamir was off somewhere doing his own thing. He added almost nothing. The locales were all very depressing, but the whole thing suffered from the same flatness I’ve been feeling this season. I did like that woman Snoop from The Wire though. She gave Baltimore some spice.
Hey Bob, good of you to check in. Karen’s right you haven’t missed much on NR, but Snoop was entertaining, and the conversation with her was the one time AB really seemed to be enjoying himself. So you’ve made it to Edmonton — how far west are you going?
BTW, Karen, what new kind of sex toys do you think Snoop could possibly market? Seems like there’s nothing much new under the sun.
Adele, Unless Snoop has discovered some new erotic orifice we’ve all been missing, I have no idea what her new products could be. But while I was listening to her, I was thinking, “Yup, she’s another one if I’d seen her on The Wire, I wouldn’t catch most of what she says.”
Other readers, to catch you up: Since Bourdain’s so keen on The Wire, I was trying to watch it through Netflix. I managed to get through the first 5 episodes of Season 1, and I liked it, although I was finding the drug crowd’s dialogue very hard to understand. Then Netflix sent me 3 cracked, scratched, unplayable Wire DVDs in a row, so I canceled the rest of them, figuring they must be attracting a rough crowd of renters and I wouldn’t live long enough to receive playable DVDs of the whole series.
And I missed the Dulcolax commercial Bosco mentioned. Must have been in the kitchen during that break. I wonder what that was all about? I’ve got it on DVD now, so I’ll have to rewind and check it out.
RE: Wire Patois.
Use the caption mode to unnastan tha slingahs on the corners, a-ight? I’m a trifle deef, anyway.
Bosco, exactly.
Ahhh Finally a Min for myself… trapped in a tent or Van for … I lost track of how long.. with the GF her Son and Mom…. Started the roadtrip in Winnipeg with “Holliday Road” from National Lampoon’s Vacation on the Radio only seems fitting.. In Calgary now on the swing back home. Jasper National Park was incredible soaring mountains and eyescapes everywere.
Banff National Park not so much, Mountains a plenty but hordes of what Bourdain would dispise as the TGI McFunster touristy croud… I keep telling myself not to be a tourist but a Traveller.. Still its been a good trip so far. But the road is starting to wear on me and I could seriously use a bottle of something strong to drink tonight..
Well two nights in a hotel, instead of on an air mattress. Looking forward to having someone else cook my meal instead of eating off the camp fire…
Take care all and thanks for letting me know that I am not missing much on the Program.. Will have to get caught up on it when I get back this week..
Toodles
Bob
Bob, if you see this, yes, you did find me on Facebook. The only reason there’s a profile there is that Facebook seemed to demand one to become a fan of the No Res page and I couldn’t find a way out of it. I just tried to send you a message through Facebook and, of course, got an error message. I hate that f**king, baffling, trainwreck of a site with a passion that burns bright and hot. Aside from reconnecting me with one friend from high school I really wanted to find, now I’m receiving the daily drivel of cousins I haven’t seen in 30+ years whose very existences we had mutually forgotten. Who needs it?
But I think it did let me invite you to be my friend. 😉