Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook (18 page)

Maybe I’m reading too much into this, but, here, is Richman
really
saying, “If only these fat fucks had laid off the dessert cart they could have outrun the flood?”

Having blamed the victims for the carnage—a direct result, he proposes, of their immoral and ungodly behavior—he seems to depict Katrina and the perfect storm of incompetence and neglect that followed as some kind of divine retribution, a punishment for libertinism.

Not yet done, he goes on to question if the food was ever any good in the first place—if New Orleans’s famous Creole cuisine (or Creoles themselves, for that matter) ever existed. Not only is New Orleans not worth visiting now, but perhaps—perhaps—it sucked all along!

What the fuck does “authentic” mean, anyway? Creole, by definition, is a cuisine and a culture undergoing slow but constant change since its beginnings, a result of a gradual, natural fusion—like Singaporean or Malaysian flavors and ingredients changing along with who’s making babies with whom, and for how long. The term “authentic”—as Richman surely knows—whether discussing Indian curries or Brazilian
feijoada
, is essentially meaningless. “Authentic” when? “Authentic” to whom? But it sounds good and wise, doesn’t it?

In the days following Katrina, chef Donald Link of the restaurant Herbsaint was one of the very first business owners to return to the city, the flood waters still barely receded, to slop out the ruins of his existing restaurant, and to—rather heroically and against all odds—open a new one. He staffed his place with anyone he could find, took on volunteers, and served food—whatever he could—in the streets, sending a timely and important message that New Orleans was still alive and worth returning to. Richman chose his restaurant to trash.

I should mention that I visited New Orleans a year
after
Richman’s article. It was a city still struggling to get up off its knees. The vast dining rooms and banquet spaces of Antoine’s, the beloved institution in the French Quarter, were mostly empty—and yet the restaurant soldiered on with nearly a full staff, unwilling to fire people who’d worked for the company for decades. Everyone I spoke to, at one point or another, would still tear up and start to cry, remembering lost friends, lost neighborhoods, whole lives swept away. It seemed sometimes like all New Orleans had had a collective nervous breakdown, their psyches shattered by first the disaster itself—and then, later, by a pervasive sense of betrayal. How could a country—their country—have let this happen, their neighbors left to huddle like cattle in a fetid, reeking stadium, or bloat and rot, day after day, in full view of the world?

It’s the kind of scenario, the kind of special circumstances, one would think, where even the most hardened journalist would ask himself, “Do I really want to kick them when they’re down?” Richman was not reporting on Watergate, after all—he wasn’t uncovering a secret Iranian nuclear program. He was writing an overview of restaurants. About a restaurant town that survives largely on its service economy. At its lowest, most vulnerable point—right after a disaster unprecedented in American history. And not for the
Washington Post
, either, mind you. For a magazine about ties and grooming accessories and choosing the right pair of slacks.

But no matter. The truth must be served. Alan Richman
knows
what “authentic” Creole cuisine means. And he damn sure wants you to know it.

This, alone, was surely reason enough to qualify as a finalist for Douchebag of the Year, but there was also this—another column: Richman’s “restaurant commandments,” in which he imperiously (if rather wittily) laid out a compendium of things which He found annoying and which those restaurants hoping to stay in His good graces should probably take to heart. This kind of article is much loved by writers in the field of restaurants, particularly recognizable ones, like Richman, whose lives are no doubt made easier in their daily rounds once their likes and dislikes have been communicated to their eager-to-please victims ahead of time. Under commandment #19, Richman lists:

As an example of lazy, disingenuous food journalism, one could scarcely hope for a better example. And this kind of cheap populism is particularly galling coming from Richman, because he knows better. If anyone knows the chef is not in, is not likely to be in, and can’t reasonably be expected to be in anytime soon—it’s Richman. He doesn’t live and work in a vacuum. He doesn’t write from a cork-lined room. Like others of his ilk, he moves in a demimonde of writers, journalists, bloggers, “foodies,” freeloaders, and publicists, all of whom know each other by sight: a large, ever-migrating school of fish involved—to one degree or another—in a symbiotic relationship with chefs. For years, he has observed his subjects being shaken down by every charity, foundation, “professional association,” civic booster, and magazine symposium—as well as by some of his colleagues. Many times, no doubt, they have complained to him (off the record) directly. Countless times, I’m sure, Richman has gazed wearily across the latest Fiji water–sponsored chef clusterfuck, over the same tuna tartare hors d’oeuvres (provided by some poor chef who’s been squeezed into service by whatever the concern of the moment is), seen the chef or chefs dutifully doing their dog-and-pony act. He also well understands, one would think, the economics of maintaining the kinds of operations he’s talking about.

Yet he demands, and expects us to believe, that every time a table of customers plunks down $200 at one of Bobby Flay’s restaurants, that Bobby himself should rush on over to personally wrap their tamales—then maybe swing by, give them a little face time over dessert. Thomas Keller, according to Richman’s thesis, should be burning up the air miles, commuting between coasts for every service at the French Laundry
and
Per Se. Particularly if Richman is in the house.

The whole suggestion is predicated on a damnable fucking lie—the BIG lie, actually—one which Richman himself happily helped create and which he works hard, on a daily basis, to keep alive. See…it makes for a better article when you associate the food with a personality. Richman, along with the best and worst of his peers, built up these names, helped make them celebrities by promoting the illusion that they cook—that if you walk into one of dozens of Jean-Georges’s restaurants, he’s somehow back there on the line, personally sweating over your halibut, measuring freshly chopped herbs between thumb and forefinger. Every time someone writes “Mr. Batali is fond of strong, assertive flavors” (however true that might be) or “Jean Georges has a way with herbs” and implies or suggests that it was Mr. Batali or Mr. Vongerichten who actually cooked the dish, it ignores the reality, if not the whole history, of command and control and the creative process in restaurant kitchens. While helpful to chefs, on the one hand, in that the Big Lie builds interest and helps create an identifiable brand, it also denies the truth of what is great about them: that there are plenty of great cooks in this world—but not that many great
chefs.

The word “chef” means “chief.” A chef is simply a cook who leads other cooks. That quality—leadership, the ability to successfully command, inspire, and delegate work to others—is the very essence of what chefs are about. As Richman knows. But it makes better reading (and easier writing) to first propagate a lie—then, later, react with entirely feigned outrage at the reality.

Underlying Richman’s argument, one suspects, is his real exasperation. Who
are
these grubby little cooks to
dare
open more restaurants? How
could
they be so…presumptuous as to try to move up and beyond their stations? Surely it is the writers of sentences, the storytellers—so close to poets—upon whom praise and riches and clandestine blow jobs should be lavished! Not these brutish, un-washed, and undereducated men whose names are known only because he, Richman, once deigned to write them down!

The line about “sous-chef Willie Norkin, who took one semester of home economics and can’t cook,” while entertaining from an ignoramus, is unpardonable coming from Richman.

The whole system of fine dining, the whole brigade system—since Escoffier’s time—is designed so that the chef might have a day off. The French Laundry, Per Se—ANY top-flight restaurant’s whole command-and-training organization—is built around the ideal of consistency, the necessity for the food and service to be exactly the same every time, whether the chef (famous or otherwise) is in or out. Richman knows full well that the chef, by the time his name is well-known enough to profitably write about, is more likely to be in the full reclining position on a Cathay Pacific flight to Shanghai than in the kitchen, when Richman next parks his wrinkled haunches into a chair in said chef ’s dining room. In any great restaurant, the food is going to be just as good without the chef as with—otherwise it wouldn’t be great in the first place.

Richman’s Commandment #19 is a fucking insult to the very people who’ve been cooking and creating dishes for him for years. What’s worse is that, once again, this uniquely gas-engorged douche knows better. But rest assured that while he has no problem giving the stiff middle finger to the people who actually prepare his food, he will be sure to remain in good odor with the “celebrity” chefs he claims—on our behalf, no doubt—to be outraged by. He needs that access, you see. He likes the little kitchen tours, the advance looks at next season’s menus, the “friends and family” invites to restaurants that have yet to open to the public, the occasional scrap of strategically leaked gossip, the free hors d’oeuvres, the swag bags, the extra courses, the attention, the flattering ministrations of the few remaining chefs who still pretend that what Alan Richman writes is in any way relevant.

Not to single out Richman.

Using his position as a critic to settle personal hash puts him in the same self-interested swamp as those of his peers who use their power for personal gain. Take John Mariani, the professional junketeer over at
Esquire
, whose “likes and dislikes” (shower cap in his comped hotel, attractive waitresses, car service) are mysteriously communicated, as if telepathically, to chefs before his arrival. (Motherfucker hands out pre-printed recipe cards on arrival, with instructions on how to prepare his cocktail of choice—a daiquiri.) This guy has been a one-man schnorrer for decades. He’s been caught red-handed on numerous occasions—but his employers continue to dissemble on his behalf. What his editors fail to understand is that all the denials in the world don’t change what everybody—and I mean
everybody
—in the restaurant business knows. Among his subjects, people don’t wonder about this guy—and whether he’s bent or not. They
know.

Simply stated, this allows savvy restaurants in Cleveland or Chicago to essentially “buy” a good review—and national coverage. Just don’t blow the gaff—as chef Homaro Cantu found out, to his displeasure. It’ll only fuck things up for everybody. After Cantu complained publicly of the way he had been treated by Mariani, making mention of the legendary wish list that preceded his arrival,
Esquire
editors made assurances that Mr. Mariani is directly responsible for no such list but artfully avoided the fact that a list most surely emanates from someone associated with him (a PR firm, perhaps?). But then the same delicate parsing of words is employed when Mariani is described as always paying for the meals that he reviews. Leaving to dangle the question of who pays for all the other meals, his transportation, lodging, and shower caps.

Over at the financial magazine
Crane’s
, longtime reviewer Bob Lape was known to one and all in the industry as “Sponge Bob.” It was not a term of endearment. He earned it—with hijinks like jacking up “friendly” chefs to provide food for his wedding. On the subject of the critic referred to as “Sgt. Pepper,” I’ll abstain. Let her go gentle into that good night. Like Richman, she did good work in her day. Maybe it helped to buy the boyfriend’s pictures, maybe not. Maybe
all
of Jerry Kretchmer’s restaurants really
were
that good. She was always, to her credit, an enthusiast first.

Richman, unlike many of his peers, generally knows what he’s talking about. As a writer, he has all God’s gifts: experience, knowledge of subject matter, a vocabulary—and the ability to put words together in entertaining and incisive fashion. Unlike the grifters, freeloaders, and pushovers who make up the majority of the food-and-dining press, Richman’s is a discerning palate. But dumping on a place because you have a personal beef with the chef (past, present, or otherwise)?

Hell, the
Times
would fire your ass for that (or, at least, “promote” you to the “T” section).

In the film
Sexy Beast
, Sir Ben Kingsley’s terrifyingly believable English gangster character frequently uses a pejorative common to the British Isles, a term that Americans must circumspectly refer to as the “c-word.” The English and Irish bandy it about often—as, in their manner of usage and in their context, it does not refer hatefully or disparagingly to a part of the female anatomy. On the contrary, it is an unflattering (even, sometimes, an affectionately unflattering) noun describing a male person—often used in conjunction with the adjective “silly.”