Bourdain’s Field Notes
KOREA, April 2015—I have, for some time, believed that the chefs doing the most interesting work in America—chefs who are in fact redefining what “American food” means—are Korean.
When I go out with non-Korean chef friends, what they want these days is Korean food. They get excited by the tangy, spicy funk of kimchi; intrigued by what is, to them, often a whole new spectrum of flavors.
Date night with my wife? Korean barbecue. And God help me, among a very small circle of friends-all of them sworn to secrecy, and on all of whom I possess horrifying and incriminating photographic evidence that ensures their silence–I have, after much soju, actually gone to Korean karaoke.
Only Korean, by the way.