Name: The Worst Thing Anthony Bourdain Ever Ate | David Letterman
Uploaded: 2025-06-25T15:00:15.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'The Worst Thing Anthony Bourdain Ever Ate | David Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2025-06-25. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'The Worst Thing Anthony Bourdain Ever Ate | David Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2025-06-25. Transcript available.

welcome back to the program good to be here i have a lot of things to talk to
you about but
first of all let's remind people that you once worked here in the same building
nearly didn't
you uh yeah that spot's not having a lot of luck is it well they got a pretty
good pizza place in
there now yeah yeah but yours was uh it was based on ed sullivan the life of ed
sullivan or something
that was the restaurant not a good theme for a restaurant i don't think you
know does ed sullivan
spell fun and delicious what was the problem there was it the the lease was the
problem the
customers the walk-in what happened there yeah yeah all of the above just didn't
work uh but but
since then you've gone on to become the chef at uh what uh yeah and uh in your
life you've been a
professional chef for like 26 years or so yeah but uh i spent the first 28
years of my working life
standing up in a small closet like uh space and one you know one or one or the
other uh all over new
york it seemed very little of the world too recently and and also a very
accomplished author best-selling
books kitchen confidential on and on and on yeah and and will eat anything look
at this guy paul is
there an ounce of fat on the man there is not you're right it's that is a real
i saw a uh a part of
the new show where you're in north vietnam and you're you're eating porcupine
yeah and and i'm i'm
thinking to myself well it's got to be horrible how can it not be horrible plus
it was like
porcupine of indeterminate age you know the restaurant was closed when we
arrived and we
were with somebody from the interior ministry who flashed a card suddenly they
opened and i'm looking
at this thing it it really looked like roadkill i was relieved in fact that
that that it was porcupine
at least it was identifiable meat you know and what did it taste like um not
like chicken yeah
somewhere between you know a turtle and cat food you know was it now now when i
when i watch you
on these shows you always make it look like you're the luckiest man alive to be
eating this this wonderful
indigenous presentation but you must run across stuff that's just god awful
right uh i was just in
iceland uh for the show and i ate they eat uh once a year they have a big sort
of a traditional festival
called torablot where they eat putrefied shark that is they let it rot and then
they marinate it in lye
or lactic acid for six months and this is like it wasn't bad enough already six
months um and i will
tell you it is the single worst thing i have ever eaten in my life and that
this is me talking so that's
i've eaten live reptile parts so this that's saying a lot and and what about it
do the icelanders enjoy
um i think it's sort of a rite of passage celebrating earlier harder times i
don't think a lot of them
like it i mean they handle it with rubber gloves or and pick it up with toothpicks
they don't even touch
it it's it's really it's really nasty you know if if you think back on your
childhood goldfish that
died like 35 years ago if you were to revisit them now and take a big bite out
of them uh that would
pretty much reproduce the same textual flavor experience i think right but the
truth of it is the human
organism can pretty much eat anything can't it uh yeah just about yeah yeah
have you ever had food
poisoning when you're traveling doing these shows i violated every known
traveler's warning of what
you're not supposed to eat under any circumstance generally if i'm a good guest
if locals are eating
it or drinking it i'll i'll do it i feel very lucky to to visit these countries
and be treated well
um the only time i've been desperately ill was in my ancestral homeland of france
i just broke down and
after you know too much rich food uh you know just every once in a while you
spin the wheel and you
lose and of course my producers love nothing more than than shooting me
catching me like curled up in
the fetal position on a cold tile floor they think that's video gold now uh on
on the the old show and
then now on the new show i notice we see quite a lot of you drinking and
smoking yeah well that's how i keep
my girlish figure but you consume a great quantity of the local spirits it
seems like you're not making
friends in the world if you if you don't keep up uh i mean i i said i'm i'm a
good guest you know you
you go to russia and the for instance where it's really tough to keep up uh all
of the toasts are
personal you know it's like this is to our you know glorious countries this is
our homelands this is
to the spirit of international cooperation this is to our mothers what are you
going to do say well
you know the hell with your mother you know i'm going to sit this one out that
doesn't work does
it i try to keep up yeah uh now in in the in the terms of uh i i think you eat
different kinds of
food than than i would order in a restaurant if i were to go into like your
restaurant what would be
the most for me unusual dish i might consume like you have sweet breads in
there we have sweet breads
we have uh pigs feet uh pigs feet how are those prepared uh all the bones are
taken out they're
they're essentially stewed till they're tender all the bones are taken out then
they're uh spread with
a little mustard bread crumbs are they tasty yeah yeah they're good yeah and
and and the sweet breads
that's uh cow brains uh thymus glands oh thymus glands they're glandy delicious
no kidding i always
thought sweet breads were the the brains what are the brains called uh brains
and well how do you
prepare the thymus glands uh light dusting of flour saute in a hot pan with
butter they're delicious
is that right yeah but i mean almost anything would be delicious prepared that
way wouldn't it
um you know i think you're gonna you're gonna find that that that most chefs uh
love that stuff after
work and for their you know it's to their own taste we get bored with steak and
lobster and uh you
know it it takes a real cook to you know coax flavor and texture out of a hoof
or snout
yes sir
now it seems like just a few years ago there was uh one or two television chefs
there was julia child
and then maybe you had jacques pepon and then that seemed like to be pretty
much the run of the mill as
far as tv chefs go and now they're just everywhere for god's sakes yeah it's
they're they're popping up
everywhere aren't they are they are these truly world class chefs that we see
on television some
of them i mean you know i may not like emerald's show but the guy's a real chef
i mean he he's worked
in the business forever he paid his dues uh guys like mario batali uh that's a
real chef
you know some of these creatures like the one on the one who has the show where
you know apparently they
show you how to take you know a two-week-old box of triscuit some cheese whiz
and some uh you know
some cool whip and you can feed your family and they'll lose weight is that
weight wow is that a
chef you know uh rachel ray cute but is that a chef but she's hot i am very
fond of rachel ray
i worry about her because she travels all over eating uh forty dollars a day
and your point about
spending forty dollars anybody can spend forty dollars a day on food if if you
stiff every waiter in town
the traveling deadbeat you know it's like tip lady but she's very very cute uh
so anyway the new show
give us an idea where you're going we know you're in vietnam we know you're
going to iceland you know
you're going to russia where what other locations uh i just got back from uzbekistan
uh let's see uh
vietnam uh i was in borneo las vegas borneo yeah with actual man eaters is that
correct uh my host i
stayed in a long house in the jungle uh with these heavily tattooed uh dyak
dudes who uh some of the
older generations still have tattoos on their fingers indicating that uh they lopped
off heads back in
the day and in fact uh i ate dinner in the longhouse with the tribe and they
had a big little bouquet of
skulls over there is that right now was that just for show or that really is no
artifacts of their
ancestors their heritage they're of recent memory in some cases right um it's
it's food folks and fun out
there it's uh simple cuisine but now how do these guys decide who they'll eat
you know i mean who makes that decision uh i don't know they were they were
couldn't have been nicer
i was grateful for that guess what we're having for dinner tonight larry
that's just awful uh well i'm fascinated uh by uh the show and also your books
and uh your restaurant
uh the show is called no reservations monday at 10 on the travel channel where
the hell is the travel
channel uh again i think in well here it's on like 88 something like but well
worth searching
around the dog yeah it's fascinating stuff anthony bourdain ladies and
gentlemen always a pleasure
you