This is who's cooking for you tonight... Tony Bourdain.
That's got to be a good thing, right?
Tony, we have a lot of people waiting outside, man, huh?
Sorry, Chef.
It's time for work. Duck fat is very hot substance.
So, gentlemen, remember this, please.
When cooking duck, always wear pants.
I've shown you something.
I'm doing a, uh, classic, uh, rosemary
and garlic, olive-oil marinade.
Now it's your turn.
Is there anything you've seen me do so far, with this dish,
you pretty much couldn't train
a reasonably intelligent Yorkie to do?
I don't think so.
Me, in the kitchen, cooking.
Try a little bit more of a stroking action.
More stroking action. You should be used to that.
♪♪
I'm Anthony Bourdain.
♪ That's right ♪ I write. I travel.
♪ Aw, look out now ♪ I eat.
And I'm hungry for more.
♪ Uhh ♪
♪♪
♪ You got this ♪
♪♪
♪ Get lost ♪
♪♪
♪ No reservations ♪
Why am I workin'?
This should be the scene where I'm sitting in a lounge chair
and you guys cook for me.
I helped my mom with Thanksgiving supper once.
We like to eat food.
It's time for business.
Uh, I feel like I'm getting back to my pioneer roots.
You know, like Pappy at the chuckwagon.
Do I get to say, "Come and get it?"
The only thing that really
matters is having the energy to get the job done.
You just rest your weary heads.
I'm cookin' tonight.
♪♪
Somewhere between the Joshua trees is
the legendary Rancho de la Luna, a recording studio
and generally kind of magical space.
The front man and linchpin for Queens of the Stone Age,
my friend, Josh Homme.
Here's the deal tonight... I crank out some food.
And I get busy throwin' together
a little thing I call asparagus risotto
with black truffle and Pecorino cheese.
When you record here, chances are, if you're not playing,
you're cooking for everybody else.
Check your shoes 'cause you just stepped in hit.
And you can eat this with a spoon, with a fork, whatever.
I got those.
Here ya go.
Well done.
By the way, your risotto should never stand up.
- Oh. - Right.
You should never be able to really mound risotto.
- It should be soupy. - Really?
I like it a little thicker. Maybe I'm just a...
Just a country boy at heart.
Enlightenment finally reaches, even this deep, into the desert.
Oh, wow.
Next, I do my best to shamelessly dupe
Scott Conant's recipe for spaghetti al a pomodoro.
Fresh plum tomatoes go right from he boiling water
into an ice bath to help them slide out of their skins.
Some onion and a little garlic
gets sautéed in good olive oil.
Add in your peeled and seeded tomatoes and some fresh basil.
While simmering, perhaps
catch up on some viral videos that you've missed.
Look at the fire extinguisher.
Sneak a little butter
into the tomato sauce for a creamy, rich texture.
Cook the spaghetti until it's almost done.
And here's a step often ignored...
Finish spaghetti in the sauce
so that it absorbs all of that delicious flavor.
And then it's time to feast.
When we sit down to enjoy the fruits of our labors,
Hutch surprises us
with a slow-cooked mesquite pulled pork.
Nice. Whew.
- How long that cook? - I started at 8 this morning.
We started drinking at 8 this morning.
Pretty much.
All right.
When you out... When you work up here,
you end up doing this all the time
because there's nowhere to go.
There's no where to go out and eat.
I think it's cool that, you know, you...
You're makin' music, somebody else is cookin'.
Well, it just... It sort of brings you together,
and you have to kind of pull together.
It's hippyish, but with showering.
When does the hunger hit? It's not right after.
So you still got the adrenaline when you get off stage.
So there's a decompression period,
how long does it take you? It takes me a couple hours.
And when you... when you collectively go somewhere
and start having a dialogue, sitting around eating,
you're able to decompress so much faster.
Nice.
♪♪
At El Bulli, they may look young,
but this is an elite group of apprentices,
or "stagiaire," as they're called here.
Even among top-tier kitchens of the world,
what is asked of the cooks here is in insanely difficult.
Now I don't know if this was a genuine attempt
at enlightening me or a somewhat perverse impulse
to entertain at my expense.
I'm assigned to another stagiaire, Vishal Khulbe,
whose job is to show me the ropes
and keep me out of trouble.
- Quemo? - Quemo.
Quemo means "somebody is behind you."
- You say it a lot. - Quemo.
- You hear "quemo"... - That's one indispensable word.
Oriol Castro is the long-time head chef at El Bulli.
Judging from the way he's looking at me,
he has a sense of humor.
There are four other chefs... Eduard Xatruch, Mateu Casañas,
Eugeni de Diego, and Marc Cuspinera.
But let me tell ya,
nothin' will make you sweat like having Ferran Adrià
looking over your shoulder. Quemo.
- Quemo. - Quemo.
This hazelnut churro
is one of the most difficult and fragile preparations
on the menu. The base right here.
- You wanna go and try it? - All right.
You got to dip the metal pastry tip quickly
into the liquid caramel,
forming a thin, not-too-thick, just-right coat on it.
Then quickly, 'cause it's hardening up now,
carefully shoot hazelnut espuma with just the right pressure,
and, hopefully, the outer layer
is stretched into a super-thin, rapidly hardening shell.
Whew. Much better.
Okay.
Quemo.
You're doing about 50 to 60 meals a night,
average 30 to 40 courses.
So that's about 1,500 plates leaving the kitchen.
1,500 incredibly precise, fragile plates.
Yeah, very fragile.
Let me ask you a question...
Has a cook ever just broken down in the middle of the shift
and started crying?
♪ No reservations ♪
You're doin' about 50 to 60 meals a night,
average 30 to 40 courses,
so that's about 1,500 plates leaving the kitchen.
1,500 incredibly precise, fragile plates.
Yeah, very fragile.
Let me ask you a question... Has a cook ever just
broken down in the middle of the shift and started crying,
put their hands in the air and said, "I can't"?
- We haven't seen that. - Okay, good to know.
Teach you one more thing. The wonton. Wonton, oh.
The rose and jamón wonton... easy.
Just remove rose pedals, blanch them three times,
make an actual aspic of intensely flavored stock
from the very best jamón Ibérico in its fat.
Then with long, skinny, never-trembling fingers,
put a precise portion
of same on each gossamer-thin pedal.
And this is the difficult part...
We have to close it without losing the jelly.
Because this turns into liquid, of course, when it's steamed,
so if it's... Any opening and it's just running right out.
Exactly. So now...
Now fold and seal in same identical way.
It has to go right there to the end.
All right. Very simple, but very technical.
Yeah. All right.
- So I could try this one? - Yeah.
This one is... It's a little bigger.
It will be easier on you. Oh, good, please. Look at these hands.
Now how many of these do you produce a night?
- Each customer gets four. - Right.
So 120.
- There you go. - Okay.
This part has to go right along the other one.
First the middle.
- First the middle? - Yeah.
And then you... left side, and then on the right side.
There.
There you go.
- Oh. - You can start.
- Difficult. - Difficult.
They're difficult.
We're gonna get... Muy importante.
He's good.
Mira.
- It's really. - You feel it?
Yeah.
One last dish to plate before my shift ends.
Maybe because it involves both sea urchin and bone marrow,
two of my all-time favorite ingredients,
I rise, somewhat, to the occasion.
All right, goes to the pass.
Take the tray.
Quemo.
Dos nigiris.
- Tell him. - Dos nigiris.
And that's when it goes.
Then you got at the table?
All right, fantastic.
What?
Oh.
- Oh, no, no. - No, no, no, no.
The last dinner.
♪♪
When in search of water fowl,
it becomes immediately clear, around these parts,
that appropriate garb is required.
Allen Albright runs me out to the family duck blind.
It's been in the same place for 40 years.
Toby's already in the blind waiting for us.
- Howdy, men. - How you guys doin'?
Good.
- How you doin'? - Good.
- Good to meet you. - Hi, I'm Tony. How are ya?
Mission... simple.
Here's your gun, see duck, shoot, hopefully kill.
So we have all kinds of ducks,
and the main duck is a mallard duck.
That's what everybody likes to shoot.
Which makes the best eatin'.
If you found a good way to eat duck, you let me know.
You don't like duck?
I have had duck about a hundred different ways,
and it taste equally as bad.
- Really? - Yeah.
- I love it. - Really?
Well, you just got to cook the fat out slow in the pan,
skin side down first.
It's pretty easy to do. You know, it's just a matter
of screwing it up a few times till you figure it out.
I need easy.
I can't cook macaroni and cheese, so...
It could be a hill to climb, I'm afraid.
I now know what I must do,
what I was put on this earth for...
I will teach these young hunters
to properly prepare a duck breast,
to not waste that which God hath put on this earth.
Which is to say,
like, make a duck breast with crispy skin,
rendered fat, and perfectly red, pink meat.
This, I shall do, o Lord.
That's what we're after, right there.
It's a nice, big bird.
We head back for an impromptu lesson in cooking.
So this is an experiment, gentlemen.
We're going to find out whether wild version of the ducks,
instead of farm-raised,
you know, are they... Can they be delicious?
♪ No reservations ♪
So this is an experiment, gentlemen.
We're going to find out whether wild version of the ducks,
instead of farm-raised,
you know, are they... Can they be delicious?
Let's find out what... You know,
we can make something delicious with just salt and pepper.
Duck fat is very hot substance,
so, gentlemen, remember this, please...
When cooking duck, always wear pants.
At this point, you want it to go slow,
pan not too hot.
I'm just gonna sit there for a while.
If you cook it right,
that fat kind of goes into the meat and all becomes,
you know, juicy and delicious.
Which, uh, which bird was this, the mallard?
The mallard.
I'm pretty sure you did not give your life in vain.
Yeah, I'm hopin' to, uh, glean something off this.
Yeah, well, we'll see. It's a noble experiment.
No duck have I ever cooked looked like that. Mnh-mnh.
Most importantly,
let that sit for a few minutes before, then,
slicing it with a sharp knife, very thinly on the bias,
like so.
- He's done that once or twice. - Yeah.
It's like, Eric, if you could grab that knife,
and it would not go anything like that.
Might cut my pinkie finger off.
Well, that's two $28 dollar orders of duck, right there.
Okay. let's see how it is.
You tell me.
That's like 800 times better than any duck
I've ever tasted.
- It doesn't suck, right? - No.
- That's good. - That's edible.
What we've been cookin' is not edible.
- I liked it. - I thought I was pretty good.
- That's ridiculous. - That's good stuff.
I'm gonna have to have some more.
Yeah, boot leather doesn't taste so good.
That's phenomenal.
We live by the rules of the wild here...
We kill it, we eat it.
And to the best of our ability, we make it delicious.
- Thank you, gentlemen. - Yes, sir.
- Thank you. - That was really fun.
The circle of life is now complete.
Well, it will be later when I take a dump.
♪♪
When you're driving 2 1/2 tons of Detroit steel
with suicide doors and a 6-mile-a-gallon V-8
built in 1965, you need a solid co-pilot.
- It's a Kennedy death car. - Yeah.
- I think it was this car, man. - Uh-oh.
'60, probably a '62.
Unfortunately, I don't have one.
I have this guy, Michael Ruhlman.
Tony, you brought all these flies here.
Flies?
It's not me. It's the camera people, man.
Swacked on engine fumes and malt liquor
and intent on spreading his reign of terror up the Hudson,
this Cleveland-based writer and one-time Food Network judge
invited himself along for the rest of the trip.
Well, many happy memories fleecing the students.
We're currently en route
to the Culinary Institute of America, my alma mater.
There was, like, a major burglary in Roth Hall.
In the middle of the day, we slipped through the tiles,
the roof tiles, got like a 1918 Château Margaux.
Ruhlman also attended the CIA, kind of.
He attended classes to write about the process for his book,
"The Making of a Chef."
See, the thing I don't...
I don't like these little, skimpy aprons.
You're right, these are a little skimpy, aren't... aren't they?
- They're... yeah. - If... if...
If you weren't wearing pants, you'd be like hangin' brains.
It's... it's like a slightly more warm bathroom
at the moment.
28 years getting a rig like this.
You got to... get... Get him puttin' on this hat.
- You got to... - Okay, that...
That's not so, uh...
I'll put... that goes on at that last possible second.
I hate these hats. Hated them then, hate 'em now.
Back when I went here, we called 'em coffee filters.
Right, here we go. We're goin' in.
Though it's been 30 years for me,
we're back in class, here to learn from this guy...
Chef instructor for the Cuisines of Asia program,
Michael Pardus.
You really should have had the wok up a little bit higher,
so you could develop a little bit more color.
Pardus is a hard man, and if you work hard,
he can be your best friend. If you don't...
So you're just gonna leave it in the wok?
No, I was gonna...
So where's the pan that you're gonna put it in?
You're not really ready.
Pardus used to regularly
tear young Ruhlman a new one
when Mr. Fancypants dilettante was in his class.
The egg debacle.
The egg debacle here, right here.
I couldn't fry an egg to save my life.
- Really? - Yeah.
- Choke... choked. - Quivering, sweatin', cursin'.
All the students were standin' there laughing at him.
It was pretty funny.
Today, our assignment is stir-fried squid with basil.
Very cool that the, you know,
the product the education is in the meal
for the rest of the school.
And it's beat the clock.
An undernourished mob
of hungry students will be arriving shortly,
and they don't want to hear any excuses from Gramps
and Pappy over here.
Not to brag, but I could handle this assignment
while getting a colonoscopy and still make it in time.
Do that, I'll do the scallions and peppers.
You do the garlic, and then we'll work on squid.
We got 45 minutes.
Yeah, this is like "Hell's Kitchen."
But I have concerns about Ruhlman,
who tends to overthink things.
Plus, he's been hitting that Aqua Velva and Adderall
pretty hard and in an ugly mood.
Man, I always get the worst partners in these classes.
Unsupervised, he could blow it for both of us.
How much green do you want on the, uh, the scallion, Chef?
Oh, use it all the way down.
Try a little bit more of a stroking action.
More stroking action, you should be used to that.
See, some things never change.
I was just like this in school by the way, too.
The guy making the nasty double entendres next to you.
- Clean squid. - "Large, bite-sized pieces."
- Squares? - Squares.
Strips? They want you to be able to be
smart enough to make some decisions on your own, I think.
- I would go rings. - It's not calamari we're making.
I don't wanna talk smack, but, uh,
you look up "chef" in the dictionary, Ruhlman,
it says, "Not you."
- Clean squid. - "Large, bite-sized pieces."
- Squares? - Squares.
Strips? They want you to be able to be smart enough
to make some decisions on your own, I think.
- I would go rings. - It's not calamari we're making.
You want these in strips, too, Chef?
Usually what I do is just cut thick rings.
See, I told you so, Ruhlman.
I Don't wanna talk smack, but, uh,
you look up "chef" in the dictionary, Ruhlman,
it says, "Not you."
So, we still got to make a sauce, don't we?
They want this ready in six minutes.
Quality of students is much better in here,
then when... when I was here, by the way.
Some of these people are, like, leavin' white-collar jobs
to do this stuff.
- Yeah. - I don't know about that.
Yeah, well, unless you're in banking.
♪♪
Just got these new woks in,
And add about 4 ounces of oil.
It's gonna get pretty smoky.
Toss in your paste, gonna be, almost, immediately aromatic.
The chile's gonna start to bite the back of your throat.
Then when you add the squid, sear it,
you put in your sauce and everything else.
Okay. There we go.
Will Chef Pardus be impressed?
If it's not right, it was Rulhman's fault.
The squid's a little rubbery,
but I don't think that's your fault.
♪♪
New York City, 8 a.m.,
As the steam rises from the morning streets,
it's also rising in the kitchen of Les Halles.
The restaurant is waking up.
Some things remain constant, as they must.
My life is completely different now,
unrecognizable to that guy I was 8 years ago.
But today, I've come back to Les Halles
to see if I can still hold up my end.
I'll be working as a line cook.
Hey, Papa, lookin' good.
Sorry about everything I'd ever said about you.
This is the easy part... Taking the familiar steps
down into the comfortable bowels of the restaurant.
Ah.
Yeah, let's, uh, save the Gordon Ramsey shot
for Ramsey's show.
Slippin' on my whites, it's like sliding into a warm bath.
, there's a headgear rule.
We all need headgear.
I never wore a hat in the kitchen.
Or at least it used to be.
Apparently a lot has changed around here.
This is the butcher now.
Nice, I think.
Holy.
Where did... Where did this space come from?
Christ, this is, like, almost professional.
This is the guy who has my old job...
Carlos, the chef, the guy in charge.
Enough water-cooler chat.
It's time for work.
If getting through a busy service period
can be compared to a military campaign,
then it's definitely true to say,
"The greater part of victory or defeat
is determined long before battle."
This is a fetish of mine.
Some things never change.
I require a lot of towels when I work.
Prior preparation, as they say, prevents piss-poor performance.
We all have weird, obsessive compulsive.
This is mine.
Well, the romance is over in about 2 hours, my friend.
The desperation point hits at around... at around 8:00.
Around 8:30 it's, "Oh, please, God, when will this be over?
"Please, God, don't let me cry on TV.
"Don't let me myself
or throw up or pass out or fall into the fryolator."
Here, the pressure is on.
Gettin' hairy out there, huh?
If you piss off an entire dining room
full of people in New York City, word travels,
it's a great story of parties.
Meaning, your ass is cooked, and maybe even the restaurant's.
Oh, . Whoa, whoa, whoa, special-needs back.
- Come on. - What happened? What happened?
Sorry, Chef.
After I'd foolishly volunteered to do this,
I began to spiral into a deep, dark, very worried place.
I mean, I was setting myself up for some very serious pain
and a very public humiliation.
This is who's cooking for you tonight... Tony Bourdain.
But you know what always makes me feel better?
When somebody else gets to share my pain.
Éric, welcome to Thunderdome, man.
- Oh, man. - It's "Apocalypse Now."
I fed my good buddy,
éric Ripert, a few shots of high-end tequila,
and oh, so casually suggested that it might be fun
to join me in this enterprise.
Understand, éric is chef of Le Bernardin,
one of the most refined
and celebrated 3-star Michelin restaurants
in the freakin' world.
The lemon juice is fantastic.
Specializing in seafood,
it's been described in some circles
as a piscatorial fantasy.
Life in the kitchen for éric is very different.
Let's think about it and tomorrow we meet again,
and we talk about that.
Éric cooks like
most big boys of his caliber these days.
Meaning, not much.
You still have a little bit of bitterness,
and I would like us to find a way to get it out.
- He tastes. - It's spicy already.
He conceptualizes.
The idea is good. The flavor is not there yet.
He creates.
Then, largely floating above the fray,
makes sure his vision is executed to his standards.
- It's okay. - That means that, like me,
he hasn't actually worked the line for years.
Listen, I have my babysitter right here.
He's lookin' after me. That's yours over there,
and we're gonna need 'em, believe me.
Okay, okay, cool.
Carlos is the boss.
You're gonna see what happens pretty quick.
Already, I'm likin' that he's got to put on the do-rag.
Yeah, totally jailhouse, man.
Holy cow.
I can't wait, uh, Tony, already.
I'm definitely gonna feel better about my own decay
watching Mr. Four- "New York Times" -Stars
get all grease-stained
as he inevitably sinks into a quicksand of sweat,
orders, and meat juices.
♪♪
Okay, we got a steak...
I mean, how long has it been
since éric cooked a steak, much less hundreds of steaks?
I'm ready on 29, whenever you're ready.
Frankly, I'm thinkin' éric's gonna go down in flames.
Éric, we're gonna have fun tonight, man.
It's gonna be like an acid trip.
Let's go, table 31, table 6, table 27, table 76, table 50.
Tony, we have a lot of people waiting outside, man, huh?
Come on, pick it up, 27, fire.
22, fire. Salmon and the steak au poivre.
Table 40 is fire. Rib eye and pork mignon.
- Éric! - Yes?
- 54 whenever you're ready! - Yes.
There's a big party, 14 people. Everything for the grill.
Okay. Five minutes.
Difficulty breathing, Chef?
Chest pains, shortness of breath?
- Yeah. - Cold sweat?
♪♪
Here's what can be discouraging about dinner...
Sometimes you'll look out into that dining room
and just see silhouettes stacked as far as the eye can see,
out the door,
waiting in the street,
six deep at the bar.
We might turn over three, four, maybe five times tonight.
No matter how many people you cook for,
no matter how fast, more will take their place.
You have to keep swimming and swimming
and swimming upstream.
Let's go! Let's go, guys!
It's getting crazy now.
I need my peppered steak, Tony, now, please.
Oh, pepper steak, did you say? Okay. Okay, okay, okay.
- Uh, where are we? - Let's go! Let's go, guys!
Okay, Tony, come on, I wanted my mussels.
I'm kind of freaked out that éric
is doing so well over there. I mean, he's pretty smooth.
I don't even see him making any sudden moves.
Okay, I need my two mussels and the cassoulet, Tony, please.
Workin'.
I haven't seen a single freakin' steak off his station
come back for a re-fire.
His plates look pretty damn good.
Worse, he actually looks happy.
He's hired. If he wants a job, he always have a job over here.
Oh, man. Now it's really on me.
I can't screw up.
Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go.
Mussels marinera...
five lamb chops, three fillet, two scallops.
My mussels, Tony, now, please! Let's go, Tony!
- I need the mussels now! - Yes, Chef.
Don't pass out. Don't pass out.
♪ No reservations ♪
Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Let's go.
Mussels marinera...
five lamb chops, three fillet, two scallops.
My mussels, Tony, now, please!
- Let's go, Tony! - I need the mussels now!
Yes, Chef.
Don't pass out. Don't pass out.
Don't pass out.
I don't want heat stroke.
I don't want to burn myself. I don't want to cut myself.
Most of all, I don't want to get yanked off the line.
How's everything, Tony?
All good, man.
Mussel in the window.
Riding the wave... That's what I like to call it.
Maybe it's a mythical notion,
but I've always felt that if you hit a certain pace early,
if you get up on the board,
you can get to a place where you've backed up the wavers.
Hey, we're lookin' good. We're lookin' good.
We are ready. You know, I think we can drill
the food out faster than they can turn the tables.
- How many special meat? - Dos. Dos. Dos.
Two, yeah. See that's what I'm goin' for.
These are medium rare.
How we doin' on 7, on that pork chop?
Yes, ready. I'm ready on the two steak poivre.
On the ventana.
It's kind of like any high-stress situation...
You're not aware of what you're doin',
you're just doin'.
- Okay. Tony, Tony. - Yes, Chef?
I want the scallops, Tony,
with salad sauce on the side, okay?
Yes, Chef. Uh, one pepper steak, right now?
And be sure that éric is ready for that.
- You ready on 9? - Yes.
- How about 8? - Yes, ready.
All right, let's do it.
♪♪
- All right. All right. - Not too bad.
I'm surprised he did really well.
I knew Carlos was worried about us,
fancy French guy and the broke-down guy.
But as the night gets late, it's startin' to look
like we could ride the wave all the way in.
Hey, we're a team already, Tony.
People will speak of this day.
20 years from now,
they will say, "I was there at Les Halles."
Yeah, it's like the zoo, you know.
Look, look! Look!
Think about all this the next time
you're reaching into your wallet for a tip.
Now the only thing left for me to think about
is finishing out the shift
and facing the reality of how I did.
♪♪
11 p.m.... customers have stopped coming in.
The board is clear.
Carlos lets me and éric slide a little early.
For me, the cooking life has been a long love affair,
with moments both sublime and ridiculous.
But like a love affair, looking back,
you remember the happy times best,
the things that drew you in,
attracted you in the first place,
the things that kept me coming back for more.
Nah, man. You're were smooth over there. You we're smooth.
Carlos liked you. I'm jealous.
That station is impossible for one.
Éric, éric, no, it has never been run by two people
ever in the history of Les Halles.
Station is amazingly, uh...
Painful.
Painful?
I think it's the toughest...
One of the toughest cooking stations in New York.
You ever worked in a turn and burn?
I have never worked in something like that ever, ever.
Cheers, man.
♪♪
- Hey, how you doin'? - Hi.
- So, this is it? - This is the new X6,
the 3.5 liter twin-turbo sports-activity coupe.
This thing's a beast.
They don't cover speeding tickets, though,
on your trip, so be careful.
We got a company that picks those up.
I get to keep this car at the end of the shoot, right?
I think that's between you and BM...
Recipe for the perfect road trip... a nice car,
the wide-open roads of the desert, and some good music.
I mean, when you think road trip,
what are the fundamentals?
Is it about the journey, or is it a destination?
A voyage of personal discovery?
Isn't there a lot of vomiting involved in a...
In a classic road trip?
Correct me if I'm wrong, vomiting is required, right?
♪♪
So this morning, I find myself barreling down the highway
on route to some watery fun.
After a few hundred miles into New Mexico,
I let somebody else take the wheel and transfer
over to the production vehicle on a mission of mercy.
The company is so cheap assed,
that with all the gas we're burnin' on this show,
they've cut back on the crew's per diems.
I thought I'd make a nice barbecue for 'em,
bring a little sunshine back into their smiles.
Few things are more fun or irresponsible than butchering
and marinating meat at unsafe speeds.
♪♪
We're boning, man.
Bonin' out a leg of lamb.
No, I'm thinkin', you know, if we stop short,
it could get ugly.
It would sure look silly
if I harpooned myself halfway through this.
Uh, I feel like I'm getting back to my pioneer roots.
You know, like Pappy at the chuckwagon.
Do I get to say, "Come and get it?"
Make home-spun fart jokes as I dole out the beans.
Oh, I hope so.
I'm doing a, uh, classic rosemary and garlic,
olive oil marinade.
Stick with the classics, that's what I say.
Especially when your kitchen's moving 80 miles an hour.
♪♪
Cameramen cannot survive on fast food and porn alone.
Whenever possible,
I like to treat them to something special,
and today was no different.
This being America, what could be more appropriate
than that most American of traditions... the barbecue.
You know, if dad teaches you anything,
it's... you just can't, uh, use enough of this stuff.
Plus it gives good flavor.
The beer.
Oh, yeah, what about the beer?
I don't know, man.
I don't think he put enough fluid on there.
That's just my personal opinion. It's not burning anymore.
He doesn't know what he's doing, obviously.
Hey, the fire's out, Tony.
You're me.
What... what's priority here, fire or beer?
Oh, my God, that's a Hobbesian choice.
♪ No reservations ♪
♪♪
Cameramen cannot survive
on fast food and porn alone.
Whenever possible, I like to treat them to something special,
and today was no different.
Hey, the fire's out, Tony.
You're me.
What's priority here, fire or beer?
Oh, my God, that's a Hobbesian choice.
Butterflied, marinated gigot of lamb Provençal.
Grilled radicchio and Belgian endive,
later to be topped with shaved Parmesan.
And, of course, Mexican beer.
God bless America.
Just rub the top of your can in lime,
dipped it in salt and...
Ahh.
That's Mexican dreer bink... Beer drinkin' goodness.
I'm cookin' tonight.
You just rest your weary heads.
♪♪
With the briquettes now doused with enough accelerant
to burn down the whole Southwest,
it's time to strap on the proper accessories.
Oh, yeah, that's the all-in-one barbecue buddy.
See, it comes with everything.
It's really fun when you get really drunk
and you just shove it right into your kidney.
Oh, your guests will love that.
When grilling,
it's important not to fuss around with your meat.
You want to flip it once,
check for doneness by poking with a finger.
I got to tell ya, boys, this food's not gonna suck.
All right, guys. Let's eat.
No salt?
- No salt for... - man.
The lamb is cooked to perfection.
The vegetables, superb,
if slightly redolent of lighter fluid,
and the extra-foamy beer
is reminiscent of such classic works
as "Sleepless in the Saddle" and "Forrest Hump."
Blast it for, like, an hour?
- Cheers. - I love it.
- Yeah, cheers. - Southwest, way to go.
Whoo. Hear, hear.
Road trip.
So, Jerry, favorite road movie.
- Mm. - Come on.
- "Easy Rider." - "Badlands."
Yeah, "Badlands."
"Badlands," ooh. Yeah.
But what's a common thing in all road movies?
There's alcohol.
Uh, it's a quest, it takes place...
The whole thing takes place on a road.
There's like... But, you know, also,
there's homosexual panic, always,
if you'll look at the classic works.
How about this one?
"Ten Commandments."
- Oh! - Oh!
- The first road movie. - Yeah, absolutely.
The only road movie.
God wrote it, man.
Ah, the joys of the great outdoors.
♪♪
Back in the trenches,
my old workplace Les Halles in New York City.
I happen to believe that you should learn
to feed yourself and maybe a few others.
In the old days, women were packed off to home ec
and taught to cook in order to be housewives
and essentially service personnel for their husbands.
Clearly, this was a bad idea.
When women said, "This is ridiculous and unfair,"
the whole system came crashing down.
I think we missed an opportunity there.
Instead of shutting down home ec,
we should have just expanded it and made everybody take it.
Everyone should know how to make a stew.
If you don't have a lot of money to spend on food,
don't feel too confident about your skills in the kitchen...
Beef bourguignon.
This dish represents a side of French cuisine
I've always loved.
It takes a minimum of preparation
and actually works best with the cheapest cuts of meat.
All right, basic rule of stewing...
Filet mignon, sirloin...
More expensive is not always better when you're stewing.
In fact, the reverse is often true.
This is a paleron, also known as a chicken steak,
but basically, it's a hunk of shoulder.
Uh, something you probably wouldn't want as a steak,
but which for stew, is perfect.
Fat, not a problem,
but this is bad fat, the shiny stuff here, right?
This rubbery stuff.
This doesn't break down.
This is all good fat.
That's collagen. Maybe you've heard of it.
It's in all your favorite movie stars' faces.
And that you can leave on.
Yeah, that's all good fat.
That's all gonna melt in all sorts of,
like, buttery, flavorful,
tasty wonderfulness, uh, after you've stewed it.
We're not looking to dazzle anybody
with our knife work here.
No particular knowledge of the anatomy of your animal
or how to butcher is needed here, obviously.
Just, you know,
you want the hunks around the same size.
All right, here's our meat here.
Next, very important, season your meat,
season it at the last minute before you cook it.
Sea salt is good, a little pepper.
All right.
We get a hot pan going here, heavy bottom, okay?
Something that's going to give even heat
and not scorch on one end and... and...
And do nothing on the other.
Okay, This is a mistake everybody makes...
They put too much meat in the pan at one time.
It shouldn't be any surprise to you that if you
throw a lot of cold stuff into a hot surface,
it makes the hot thing colder.
You don't want to burn the out of it, mind you.
You want brown, not black, okay?
My meat instructor always used to say,
"Black is beautiful, but not on meat."
The meat is brown.
On to the next step.
I'm gonna pour off extra grease.
I'm leaving all the schmutz in the bottom of the pan,
that's good stuff, okay?
And these I keep moving.
You do not want to burn your onions.
Basically, you want to cook 'em gently.
You're not lookin' to brown them.
You just want to cook 'em till they get clear.
By clear, I mean, you know, kind of translucent.
Okay.
Now this dish is called beef bourguignon.
Okay, dish came Burgundy.
We would like to use wine from Burgundy.
That's why they did it in the first place,
and it seems to really work out.
But, okay, let's say you don't have a lot of money.
Even some crappy Burgundy, you know, jug or box Burgundy,
will do in a pinch, honestly.
You're cooking off most of the alcohol,
and you're infusing with a lot of other flavors.
So doesn't have
to be that great, that's what I'm saying.
Now you want to crank up your heat, just for a second.
And throw in some wine,
throw your meat in.
Be honest, is there anything you've seen me do so far
with this dish you pretty much couldn't, like,
train a... a reasonably intelligent Yorkie to do?
I don't think so.
These are big hunks.
I'm throwin' 'em right in with my meat,
and I'm just gonna cook the out of 'em
along with everything else.
Because, really, is an overcooked carrot
in a really delicious, meaty sauce every a bad thing?
No. In the meantime, your only responsibility
is to not this up by letting it burn or scorching it.
So that means, you know, as you're finishing off
the rest of this jug of undistinguished faux Burgundy
from... Yugoslavia or whatever.
As you wander by, give your meat a little poke, move it around,
make sure nothing's sticking or scorching on the bottom.
Check your flame,
make sure that, you know, your...
Your crackhead roommate didn't turn up the flame
or anything, okay?
It's hours later, the sauce is now reducing,
meaning there's less of it.
There's no reason at all to take up that much stove space.
So I have simply transferred it to a smaller,
but equally thick-bottomed pot.
All right. It is now cooked.
It is tender.
Look at that magnificently thick, rich sauce that's been
created from what previously just a bunch of raw wine
and ugly-ass cookin' liquid.
Something green, kind of pull out the color.
Makes a big difference.
Come on, look at that.
Should be tender,
meaning you should be able to mash your fork into this
and break off a piece.
Hey, that's not bad.