Podcat

I'm about his age (no Brazilian martial-arts wife), retired. Got the time, the money, the miles. No TV show.

Travelling for me, food is my sole interest. I want a guide like he has, some local expert on the best pho restaurant in Ho Chi Minh City, or the best crickets in Zhengdu. That covers the restaurants.

Without having my own show, that will be challenging enough.

But the real holy grail is to get invited into people's homes for the traditional feasts he shares. Fresh-caught barnacles in the Azores, a pig roast in Kentucky. How can I make this happen without cameras rolling? Or do I need to have a fake production team, Argo style? I'll do what it takes. But what exactly will it take?

That's my dream -- travel here, there, everywhere, to eat and drink like my hero.

Suggestion?
Bring 'em!

mandolino

Work on production crew. A friend does it for BBC food shows. The presenters can only eat a small bit at a time, as they might have to do multiple takes and different episodes in one day. Then the crew moves in and hoovers up the rest!!!

He said cooking and food shows are more popular than celeb shows with most of the crews. Except maybe the ones on a diet.

zigzagg900

Check out tours through Viator. In Paris, for example, you can sign up for cooking classes or a dinner with local hosts.

lili

Italy okay?


http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/11/tr...anted=all&_r=0

MSPeconomist

Some places have programs for tourists to meet locals, often organized in advance through the local or national tourist board. If you hit it off with someone, you might be invited for a home meal or family celebration.

Staying in a smaller but elegant family run B&B or arranging ladging through an outfit like AirBnB might ideally lead to some local suggestions and, again if you get along well, you could get lucky.

Note that in some countries/cultures, visiting colleagues are invited home for dinner, while in other place, such as Japan, this is almost unheard of.

Another way to meet locals can be to volunteer and arrange travel for that purpose. I mention this especially since the OP is retired and seems to have both time and money.

chgoeditor

Local foodie "fixers" aren't millionaires. For a fee, I suspect many would be happy to do for you something similar to what they've done for Bourdain or other travel shows. In Chicago, for example, I think Louisa Chu did a lot of behind the scenes work for Bourdain when No Reservations Required came to Chicago.

Otherwise, start following the most influential food bloggers in a city or region, particularly those who are professionals. For example, David Lebovitz, who's worked at places like Chez Panisse and is the author of several cookbooks, leads food tour in Paris (where he lives) and other parts of Europe. Not sure if he does them in the US, too. I'm not sure if he's still doing it, but David Rosengarten has done the same over the years. These are high-end tours led by people who have a ton of connections and include a lot of experiences you wouldn't otherwise have access to.

TH310

Consider posting a profile on a site like home exchange.com. Swap houses with like-minded people and arrange introductions to friends and neighbors for each other, as well as reservations at exciting restaurants. This will help ensure that you're actually meeting locals. State in your profile exactly what you're interested in doing, and I'm sure you'll find someone that's willing to trade. I just saw Anthony Bourdain's show on Montreal and Quebec City! Planning to check out some of the those locations when I'm there next summer!

carybrevard

My sense is that OP is after a less-choreographed, more down-home person-to-person kitchen exchange to accompany the easier to experience “best of” restaurant crawls.

Almost all areas have specific food items of which almost every home cook has his or her own version – and great pride in the result and thoughts as to why his/her version is the best. Wherever you are, learn enough of the language to be able to ask about the particular item and then start asking who in the area makes the best version of it – at the markets, at the dock, somewhere close to the source of the hog, the mussels, or whatever. If you want to learn how to prepare it, all the better. You may find doors opening even without having to drag all those cameras and sound equipment around. Genuine curiosity and respect for wherever you find yourself should take you a long way.

Ikaz

Otherwise you could use Couchsurfing, although the original idea is to find a place to sleep, it can actually work if you just want to meet locals, and here again one solution could be to ask if it would be possible for them to show you how to prepare the local food, and do the whole activity with them.

cbn42

https://www.mealsharing.com/

beachbum61

First, let me say that Anthony Bourdain has the best job... ever.

But we cannot aspire to those heights, so I will pass on my thoughts. I am also a foodie when I travel. Going to another museum, church, temple bores me to tears, but I am not a history buff.

I think one possibility is to use the various homestays that are now available. In my case I go to Thailand a couple of times a year. There are many Thais who advertise homestay through sites like airbnb and others, and if you review their pages with a view towards the food aspect, and make it clear you are interested in food they will help you. I have a friend in Thailand who opens up her village home for homestays and, if you ask, will take you to the markets, show you the food, and cook it for you. But you have to say that is what you are interested in. Otherwise they will take you to the local museum.

I will admit that Thailand is a super food culture, so your experience may not be the same in all places, but I think you can do the same thing in other cultures.

bones718

get the names of his production people that you often see on his shows. shoot them emails, get the fixers from them.

goku001

My suggestions are going to revolve around food tours and very Asian centric, so apologies in advance.

I follow both these people on Twitter so know of them. Robyn runs occasional food tours from Eating Asia. Here's her website - http://eatingasia.typepad.com/. The other gentleman from Mumbai that I know of is Finely Chopped's Kalyan. He gives an awesome insight into Bombay's food. You can find more about his walks here - http://www.finelychopped.net/p/finely-chopped-waks.html.

The other option but you will need to do a fair amount of location based searching is http://www.tourhq.com/. Its a relatively young website, guess, similar to Viator. I think you should be able to find food guides on there.

tmorse6570

The food is interesting, but in most shows, Anthony looks like he's plowed. Between the statin he takes and the alcohol, I doubt his liver will last much longer. I'm surprised his wife and having a daughter haven't made him cut back.

zcat18

Not to take this too far off subject, but back in the day, he was a heavy user of cocaine and heroin, both of which he stopped long ago. I don't watch him much (cannot stand his on-air persona), but I think he overplays the drinking for the cameras. In reality, he rarely seems to have more than a couple of drinks in a sitting.