Anthony Bourdain was famous for a lot of things such as his fearless taste buds, zest for travel, as well as his poetic writing style.
Much of his writing inspires people to experience culture through food and also to get off their couch and out of their comfort zone.
While Anthony Bourdain is no longer with us in the physical world, at least we have his quotes to help inspire us to be more adventurous and live our best life.
There are his “Kitchen Confidential” quotes, along with a series of quotes about life, culture, and adventure. We have broken up some of our favorite quotes below by genre – travel, food, and life.
“If I believe in anything, it is doubt. The root cause of all life’s problems is looking for a simple f—ing answer.”
“I’m through being cool. Or, more accurately, I’m through entertaining the notion that anybody could even consider the possibility of coolness emanating from or residing anywhere near me.”
“An ounce of sauce covers a multitude of sins.”
“Good food is very often, even most often, simple food.”
“You have to be romantic to invest yourself, your money, and your time in cheese.”
“You can dress brunch up with all the focaccia, smoked salmon, and caviar in the world, but it’s still breakfast.”
“For me, the cooking life has been a long love affair, with moments both sublime and ridiculous.”
“Food is everything we are. It’s an extension of nationalist feeling, ethnic feeling, your personal history, your province, your region, your tribe, your grandma. It’s inseparable from those from the get-go.”
“Luck is not a business model.”
“The way you make an omelet reveals your character.”
“But I do think the idea that basic cooking skills are a virtue, that the ability to feed yourself and a few others with proficiency should be taught to every young man and woman as a fundamental skill, should become as vital to growing up as learning to wipe one’s own ass, cross the street by oneself, or be trusted with money.”
“I don’t have to agree with you to like you or respect you.”
“An egg in anything makes it better.”
“I learned a long time ago that trying to micromanage the perfect vacation is always a disaster. That leads to terrible times.”
“I, personally, think there is a real danger of taking food too seriously. Food should be part of the bigger picture.”
“The mishandling of food and equipment with panache was always admired; to some extent, this remains true to this day.”
“Your body is not a temple, it’s an amusement park. Enjoy the ride.”
“You learn a lot about someone when you share a meal together.”
“But I’m simply not going to deceive anybody about the life as I’ve seen it. It’s all here: the good, the bad and the ugly.”
“There is no Final Resting Place of the Mind.”
“Skills can be taught. Character you either have or you don’t have.”
“I have a tattoo on my arm, that says, in ancient Greek, ‘I am certain of nothing.’ I think that’s a good operating principle.”
“Without new ideas, success can become stale.”
“What are our expectations? Which of the things we desire are within reach? If not now, when? And will there be some left for me?”
“Plans should be ephemeral, so be prepared to move away from them.”
“Nothing unexpected or wonderful is likely to happen if you have an itinerary in Paris filled with the Louvre and the Eiffel Tower.”
“Do we really want to travel in hermetically sealed popemobiles through the rural provinces of France, Mexico and the Far East, eating only in Hard Rock Cafes and McDonald’s? Or do we want to eat without fear, tearing into the local stew, the humble taqueria’s mystery meat, the sincerely offered gift of a lightly grilled fish head?”
“Drink heavily with locals whenever possible.”
“I’m a big believer in winging it. I’m a big believer that you’re never going to find perfect city travel experience or the perfect meal without a constant willingness to experience a bad one. Letting the happy accident happen is what a lot of vacation itineraries miss, I think, and I’m always trying to push people to allow those things to happen rather than stick to some rigid itinerary.”
“Travel is about the gorgeous feeling of teetering in the unknown.”
“Travel isn’t always pretty. It isn’t always comfortable. Sometimes it hurts, it even breaks your heart. But that’s okay. The journey changes you; it should change you. It leaves marks on your memory, on your consciousness, on your heart, and on your body. You take something with you. Hopefully, you leave something good behind.”
“If I’m an advocate for anything, it’s to move. As far as you can, as much as you can. Across the ocean, or simply across the river. The extent to which you can walk in someone else’s shoes or at least eat their food, it’s a plus for everybody. Open your mind, get up off the couch, move.”
“It seems that the more places I see and experience, the bigger I realize the world to be. The more I become aware of, the more I realize how relatively little I know of it, how many places I have still to go, how much more there is to learn.”
“Travel changes you. As you move through this life and this world you change things slightly, you leave marks behind, however small. And in return, life — and travel — leaves marks on you.”
“Perhaps wisdom. . . is realizing how small I am, and unwise, and how far I have yet to go.”
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