How to Eat & Enjoy Like Anthony Bourdain 

Anthony Bourdain didn’t write wellness manifestos or preach restrictive diets. He wasn’t the kind of man to obsess over macros or pretend kale smoothies could save your soul. What he offered instead was far more radical: an unflinching belief that food is culture, food is story, and food is meant to be shared, savoured, and respected.

In a world obsessed with detoxes, greenwashed “superfoods,” and “clean eating” marketing campaigns, Bourdain’s voice cut through the noise. His philosophy? Eat honestly. Travel curiously. Indulge fully. And never, ever apologize for the pleasure of food.

At Tallow Twins, we can’t help but see how closely his worldview mirrors ancestral eating - the way our grandparents and great-grandparents nourished themselves before modern food science complicated everything. Cooking with real food, gathering at the table, rejecting diet culture, and respecting food’s cultural roots? It’s all very Bourdain.

Food Is Culture: Why Every Bite Is a Story

Anthony Bourdain spent his life proving a simple truth: food is the fastest way to understand a place and its people. You can learn more about history and humanity from a street-side bowl of noodles in Hanoi than from any glossy travel guide.

This isn’t “foodie tourism.” This is anthropology with a fork.

Every culture has its ancestral staples - the fats, the meats, the grains, the spices - and they tell a story of climate, survival, and resourcefulness. When you eat pho, you taste the resourceful use of bones for broth. When you eat cassoulet, you taste centuries of peasant food evolving into something revered. When you render tallow and cook with it, you’re tasting the way humans have eaten for thousands of years.

Modern wellness trends like to erase this complexity in favour of buzzwords. “Clean,” “green,” “superfood.” Bourdain would’ve called it out for what it is: hollow marketing. Real food doesn’t need a PR campaign. Real food has roots.

Tallow Twins exists in that same rebellion. We celebrate tallow not because it’s trending, but because it’s part of the human story. It’s culture in its most useful form.

Respect What’s on the Table

Bourdain had no patience for people who refused to taste what was offered. For him, sitting at someone’s table meant honouring their effort, their ingredients, their traditions. Refusing food wasn’t just impolite; it was missing the point of travel, of connection, of eating itself.

Respect is an ancestral value, too. When humans raised and harvested animals, nothing went to waste. Bones became broth. Organs were prized. Fat was rendered into tallow. This wasn’t trendy; it was necessary. Respect meant using the whole animal and nourishing the whole community.

Cooking with tallow today isn’t just about flavor (though it’s unmatched for that crispy potato or perfectly seared steak). It’s about honouring food in its most complete form. It’s about rejecting the wastefulness of modern industrial food systems and reconnecting to the old truth that nothing should be squandered.

To eat like Bourdain is to approach your plate with humility. To eat ancestrally is to do the same.

Reject Food Snobbery

Anthony Bourdain loved Michelin-starred meals. He also loved cheap bowls of noodles, tacos on the side of the road, and late-night diner burgers. He didn’t rank them; he respected them equally. What mattered wasn’t the setting or the price tag. What mattered was joy.

This was perhaps his most radical stance: food should never be about gatekeeping.

Wellness culture has it's downsides - you need this imported adaptogen, you need that branded collagen powder, you need this influencer-approved supplement. These days, its almost if Bourdain’s eye-roll could be felt across continents.

Tallow Twins is firmly in his camp. We believe you don’t need overpriced “superfoods” when your grandmother’s pantry already holds everything you need. A jar of fat on your counter can transform potatoes, vegetables, or pasture-raised steak into something extraordinary- no labels, no snobbery, no exclusivity. Just real food, made with real fat, for real people.

Eating like Bourdain is about joy, not status. 

Take the Time to Enjoy and Indulge

In a culture obsessed with “what’s next,” Bourdain reminded us to slow down. He lingered at tables, refilled glasses, asked questions, and laughed loudly. He indulged, not with guilt, but with curiosity and reverence.

This, too, is ancestral. Humans didn’t eat quickly and distractedly over their laptops. They sat together, shared food, and let meals stretch into evenings. They indulged in fatty cuts of meat, in long-simmered stews, in foods that nourished and satisfied.

Eating like Bourdain means taking pleasure seriously.

Indulgence Without Apology

Anthony Bourdain didn’t just eat for sustenance; he relished food with the kind of unapologetic hunger most of us have been taught to suppress. He believed in the small luxuries: an affogato and a cigarette while watching the world go by, a greasy burger and fries at 2 a.m. after one too many rounds, a long lunch that turned into dinner because the conversation and wine refused to stop.

This wasn’t gluttony. It was present. Bourdain understood that indulgence, when rooted in curiosity and honesty, is part of what makes us human. He never moralized food. He never apologized for it. He savoured it.

That’s ancestral wisdom, too. Our grandparents weren’t counting calories on their Sunday roasts. Eating ancestrally isn’t about restriction; it’s about living fully in the moment, trusting real food to nourish you, and letting yourself enjoy it without guilt.

In a culture obsessed with “hacks” and “clean eating,” this kind of indulgence feels radical. But maybe the most radical thing of all is to slow down, taste deeply, and let yourself be satisfied.

Eat With Other Humans

Bourdain rarely ate alone. His shows were built on the simple idea that food is best experienced in community. Meals were his excuse to sit with strangers, listen to their stories, and walk away a little less of a stranger himself.

This lesson is urgent in our time of hyper-individualized eating. Solo meals in cars, snacks in front of screens, “fuel” bars between meetings. We’ve lost the ritual of sitting at a table together.

Bourdain knew this: food is about people. Without others, it’s just calories. With others, it’s communion.

Travel With Curiosity (and Without Judgment)

Travel, for Bourdain, wasn’t about luxury resorts or curated Instagram photos. It was about curiosity. He sought out the back alleys, the roadside stands, the homes where food told the truest story of a place. He ate without judgment. He travelled without ego.

When you strip away modern snobbery, you see food for what it really is: survival, ingenuity, and generosity. To eat like Bourdain is to approach the world with curiosity. To eat ancestrally is to approach food with the same.

How To Embrace His Philosophies in Everyday Life

Anthony Bourdain showed us that food isn’t about restriction, snobbery, or performance. It’s about curiosity, respect, community, and indulgence. But eating like Bourdain isn’t just about what’s on your plate, it’s about how you live.

To enjoy like Anthony Bourdain, try to:

• Travel more, even if it’s just to the next neighbourhood over.

• Put your phone down and actually taste what’s in front of you.

• Talk to strangers, especially the ones cooking your food.

• Say yes to new flavours, even when they scare you.

• Take yourself out to dinner and sit at the bar, just to see what happens.

• Order the fries. Drink the wine. Have the affogato.

Eating (and enjoying) like Bourdain is a rebellion against going through life half-asleep. It’s about curiosity, indulgence, and presence, qualities that make food, and life itself, worth savouring.