Anthony Bourdain was never bashful about telling people exactly what he thought. His unvarnished
take on life inside a restaurant kitchen is what made his 1999 book, Kitchen Confidential,
such a must-read for anyone who works in a restaurant — or eats in one. Never order fish
on Monday, Bourdain proclaimed in the book. Why? It's going to be at least four days old.
"You are less likely to receive fresh fish on a Monday, or
a Sunday or a Monday, than you are on a, on a Tuesday."
Bourdain also didn't think too highly of brunch. He wrote in The New Yorker that same year that:
"The 'B' word is dreaded by all dedicated cooks."
Bourdain thought brunch was an excuse to get rid of the leftovers from the
previous night's dinner and claimed that you get the less experienced
cooks on a brunch shift. Indeed, Bourdain hated everything about brunch,
right down to the hollandaise sauce that goes on brunch mainstay Eggs Benedict.
"I love frightening people away from brunch, largely cause I just don't like to cook it."
Bourdain lumped hollandaise in with home fries and fruit garnishes,
referring to them all in The New Yorker as:
"Cliché accompaniments designed to induce a credulous public into paying $12.95 for two eggs."
But that's just one of many problems he had with the sauce. The chef didn't seem to care
that hollandaise has exalted status as one of the five French mother sauces.
Hollandaise is a simple sauce, made from whisking clarified butter into warm egg yolks.
Everyone from the American Egg Board to Gordon Ramsay has a recipe;
you add lemon, salt, and pepper. Depending on the recipe, you also should add a flavorful spice,
such as paprika or tarragon. The key to every recipe is making sure the egg yolks don't get too
warm or they'll break, and the egg in hollandaise sauce is going to be pretty close to raw.
The risk of getting sick from eating raw eggs has been widely publicized,
the specific culprit being salmonella. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control says hens
can carry the bacteria and transfer them to their eggs. Cooking the eggs
thoroughly will kill the bacteria, but that's not an option with hollandaise.
Bourdain went on a mini-rant against hollandaise sauce in Kitchen Confidential,
suggesting that he never touched the stuff. He wrote:
"How about hollandaise sauce? Not for me. Bacteria love hollandaise."
You might guess that Bourdain is taking his cue from the U.S. Department of Agriculture,
which asserts that no one should eat foods containing raw eggs. The agency even mentions
hollandaise sauce by name, but Bourdain wasn't thinking about the salmonella risk. He was
instead worried about the fact that hollandaise sits out during the entire brunch service.
If the line cooks refrigerated the sauce or kept it in bacteria-killing heat, it would break.
Bourdain suggested that he'd be OK with hollandaise sauce
if chefs made it to order. But it's time-consuming and unrealistic during
a busy brunch rush. Bourdain said it doesn't happen in practice, writing:
"Most likely, the stuff on your eggs was made hours ago and held on station."
By the time Bourdain updated Kitchen Confidential with his Insider's Edition in 2012, he'd had a
change of heart about hollandaise sauce and a few other things, including fish on Mondays.
In a video that shows Bourdain hashing out the Kitchen Confidential update with his publisher,
he seemed to regret the damage he may have done to restaurants' reputations.
In one revision Bourdain gave his publisher, he wrote:
"Eat the fish, you know, unless you're at an Irish pub on like, Monday morning."
Bourdain later elaborated on why he was backing away from his fish rule. He explained:
"Things are better now, you know. People actually give a s---."
Thinking back on his original pronouncement about fish on Mondays, Bourdain told his publisher:
"I feel bad about that."
Bourdain also softened his stance on hollandaise sauce,
but still gave warning about bacteria, saying:
"On balance, there's nothing wrong with hollandaise, as long as you eat it,
like early in the shift Place opens at 12? Between 12 and 1, you're OK. Around 3:30 ... maybe not."
In the end, Bourdain didn't say to never order the hollandaise sauce.
You have a one-hour window, so you better get to your favorite brunch spot early!
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