Hungry: Eating, Road-Tripping, and Risking It All with the Greatest Chef in the World

by Jeff Gordinier

Hungry is a book about not only the hunger for food, but for risk, for reinvention, for creative breakthroughs, and for connection. Feeling stuck in his work and home life, writer Jeff Gordinier happened into a fateful meeting with Danish chef Ren� Redzepi, whose restaurant, Noma, has been called the best in the world. A restless perfectionist, Redzepi was at the top of his game but was looking to tear it all down, to shutter his restaurant and set out for new places, flavors, and recipes.

This is the story of the subsequent four years of globe-trotting culinary adventure, with Gordinier joining Redzepi as his Sancho Panza. In the jungle of the Yucat�n peninsula, Redzepi and his comrades go off-road in search of the perfect taco. In Sydney, they forage for sea rocket and sandpaper figs in suburban parks and on surf-lashed beaches. On a boat in the Arctic Circle, a lone fisherman guides them to what may or may not be his secret cache of the world's finest sea urchins. And back in Copenhagen, the quiet canal-lined city where Redzepi started it all, he plans the resurrection of his restaurant on the unlikely site of a garbage-filled lot. Along the way, readers meet Redzepi's merry band of friends and collaborators, including acclaimed chefs such as Danny Bowien, Kylie Kwong, Rosio S�nchez, David Chang, and Enrique Olvera.

Genres: Food, Nonfiction, Memoir, Travel, Cookbooks, Cooking, Biography

240 pages, Hardcover

First published July 9, 2019

About the author

Jeff Gordinier is the food and drinks editor of Esquire and a frequent contributor to the New York Times. A product of Southern California and a graduate of Princeton University, he wrote 2008’s X Saves the World and co-edited the 2015 essay collection Here She Comes Now. He lives north of New York City with his wife, Lauren Fonda, and his four children.

Reviews

[Cat · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gordinier is a stylish writer who draws compelling analogies between music and food, both forms of social capital reflective of the trends of the times, yet also sensuously engaging, potentially psychologically and viscerally revelatory experiences. He casts René Redzepi as a kind of Gatsby (he alludes to the novel in the book and even uses an epigraph from it for a chapter), building dream castles in the sky...or rather in Copenhagen, Sydney, and Tulum, Mexico. The best parts of the book were Gordinier's own reflections on his failing marriage, his desire for escape and adventure through travel, his new love with a woman who shared those obsessions, and his ultimate philosophy that moving on is what life (and creativity) are all about. Also, some of Redzepi's research projects (like learning to master mole) are compelling topics; I'd love to taste the mole that is 364 days old and still cooking. And it is fascinating to read about all of his acolytes who brave crazy conditions to forage for him and to find local farmers and resources. Redzepi's locavore obsession appeals to me. And yet, at the same time, there is something in the very Gatsby-ness of this (haute cuisine as conspicuous consumption of the highest quality, rarest, most local ingredients) that is troubling, even when Redzepi goes to such lengths to learn from locals. Gordinier's feeling that Redzepi is a guru is tempered by his recognition of Redzepi's existential and personal restlessness. There is something dude-rific about this, though, and Gordinier as Carraway doesn't quite dismiss my feeling that these is some masculinist bravado in this particular cult of hunger. Still, a pleasure to read the prose, and I wish I could sample the meals. (Too bad I can't cough up $600 for a dinner.)

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Noma, René Redzepi’s restaurant in Copenhagen, Denmark, has widely been considered the best in the world. In 2013, though, it suffered a fall from grace when some bad mussels led to a norovirus outbreak that affected dozens of customers. Redzepi wanted to shake things up and rebuild Noma’s reputation for culinary innovation, so in the four years that followed he also opened pop-up restaurants in Tulum, Mexico and Sydney, Australia. Journalist Jeff Gordinier, food and drinks editor at Esquire magazine, went along for the ride and reports on the Noma team’s adventures, painting a portrait of a charismatic, driven chef. For foodies and newbies alike, it’s a brisk, delightful tour through world cuisine as well as a shrewd character study.

See my full review at BookBrowse. (See also my article on the rise of the celebrity chef.)

[Deb (Readerbuzz) Nance · Rating 4 out of 5]

Food critic Jeff Gordinier travels the world with the esteemed chef Rene Redzepi in search of the world's best flavors. Redzepi is founder of Noma, a restaurant in Denmark often deemed the finest restaurant in the world. Despite his renown, Redzepi wants to close his restaurant, and start from scratch in new places with new recipes and tastes.

Gordinier is a beautiful writer, filling the pages of this foodie travel narrative with fresh, almost brilliant comparisons that light up the zany words of the wildly creative chef and his crew. It's crazy to follow the adventures of this group of sensory-enhanced people, who seem to live to discover odd new flavor combinations. "It's like a whole new energy enters your body when you come out to these parts," one of the crew says. And it's true. The whole book is infused with this energy; it's like you eat the best meal of your life and you don't add a single calorie.

[Melissa · Rating 2 out of 5]

*This review is part of the Amazon Vine program.

I've sat on this review for awhile just because I was having trouble with it. See, I wanted to like this book, it was about food and pushing the boundaries of cuisine. Seems like exciting stuff, right? And while it was for some of it, I just couldn't sink into the writing style or the story. It was too unapproachable for me.

Gordinier is offered the chance to travel and work with Redzepi, the chef of the famous Noma. Redzepi is looking to reinvent himself and the way people think about food again, and so the author gets to join him on his trips and discuss these ideas.

It's a very descriptive book, and I will say that I loved the descriptions of the food. Unfortunately those seemed to take a seat behind the arguments, worries, and other such human drama that is present when you're working with restaurants. While it adds color, it's also distracting sometimes. Especially when Gordinier himself inserts some of his personal drama in, but not enough to make you feel good about it. In fact, I feel kind of bad for his families as he mentions them, but the descriptions of them don't really hold any warmth (except for maybe an initial description of the new girlfriend, after she makes wife status that warm fuzzy feeling suddenly is removed from the mentions). I don't know, I know he's not the book's purpose, but that just kind of turned me off of it a bit because I couldn't stop feeling sorry for his kids. It just made it hard to focus on the food.

Memoir or biography, it's really hard to qualify this book. I think had it just been about Redzepi and the food and he left the memoir-ish parts out (as much as he could since he was traveling with the guy) it would have been a bit more engaging. More food descriptions, more travel, can't go wrong with that.

Not one for me unfortunately.

Review by M. Reynard 2019

[Brittany · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite type of book. Food and music and travel and real people's stories. I didn't lose interest once.

[GONZA · Rating 4 out of 5]

Centered on the life of Noma's chef Renè Redzepi, this book tells of his search for extraordinary ingredients, his desire to always start something new and how, in his perpetual movement, he has not avoided involving other people who, in the end, can only be grateful to him.
I liked it almost to the level of "Kitchen Confidential".

Centrato sulla vita dello chef di Noma Renè Redzepi, questo libro racconta la sua ricerca di ingredienti straordinari, della sua voglia di ricominciare sempre qualcosa di nuovo e di come, in questo suo perenne movimento, non abbia evitato di coinvolgere altre persone che alla fine, non potranno che essergliene grate.
Mi é piaciuto quasi ai livelli di "Kitchen Confidential".

[Zinnia · Rating 4 out of 5]

If I die before going to noma for the summer menu, please know I died unhappy

[Oliver Fletcher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Exactly the invigorating read I needed to begin the year.

Somespace to vicariously live out my desperate, post-covidian fantasies of vital and resuscitative food and travel. Of escaping myself in the overflowing life of Oaxacan markets. Of the extra-planetary solemnity of ultra cold, near arctic Norwegian islands and peninsulas.

But I suppose here we are, just waiting it out, persevering in the hope that life and the tiny windows we ever really get to view the heart of it through can continue again soon.

[Griffin Duffey]

a reread by way of listening to the very good audiobook. a weird comfort read for me. it was recommended to me by a chef friend of mine. this + A Work in Progress admittedly is some of my favorite stuff to dive into and get lost in. I’ll always be grateful for how food and bev has become an outlet for me in the last several years.

[Adam Roberts · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent, bird's eye view of a genius chef going through a personal, professional crisis. Noma suffered a scandal in 2013 when Norovirus sickened a bunch of guests and Rene Redzepi, who was perched on the highest peak of the culinary world, took a tumble. This book tracks his way out of the hole while Jeff Gordinier, the author, pulls himself out of his own personal hole after a divorce. What I liked most about this book was the way it shows how pushing yourself to the brink -- in your personal life or your professional life or both -- can yield greater, more illuminating discoveries. A very inspiring read.

[Boy Blue · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eating is one of the things that universally connects humans. It's a necessity for human life. I'm sure chefs have been celebrated since Og first figured out how to season his mammoth t-bone with some salt and cook it over a fire. Masterchef, Chef's Table, Megastar Chefs, Social Media, Globalisation, and the prevalence of ingredients have meant that in many first world countries eating has taken a back seat to tasting and dining. We've moved from a world where we eat to nourish ourselves to one where we attempt to gratify our sense of taste first and foremost; a hedonistic pursuit of pleasuring a sense.

In this arena where food is primarily a chance to tantalise the tastebuds Rene Redzepi reigns supreme. Now some will say he's changed the world with his foraging and use of local ingredients (I would argue he's made it trendy for high cuisine not changed the world) and he's achieved a lot for high cuisine. Gordinier certainly thinks he's the second coming and this book is a cobbled together hagiography; idolising and worshipping Redzepi. At times it seems more focused on the Redzepi cult of personality than on the food he cooks. I wish Gordinier had have applied some of his writerly skills to addressing the more salient philosophical issues behind Noma or just have been even slightly critical at some stage. Instead, he seems so desperate to be in Redzepi's orbit and to be one of the boys.

Another key flaw in the book is that too much of it is about the ordinary food writer Gordinier and not enough about his extraordinary subject Redzepi; as if the book is not sure if it's a writer's memoir or a biography about a famous chef. A genuine biography definitely would have been better.

It's clear that this book is Gordinier's attempt to try to make some money back for all the crazy Noma related trips he took. He had no plan from the beginning to write this book, and it shows. Things like the build up of tension for Noma Mexico because a patron pulls their $600k funding make for exciting reading but then it's never resolved, we never find out how they did get funding. The debate around whether a $600 per person meal in Mexico is reasonable is only ever discussed flippantly and because the writer feels like he's in the trenches with the Noma crew he doesn't even consider merits of arguments from the other side. It's a chaotic and tumultuous memoir. There's no rhythm, rhyme, or reason to when he's spending time with Redzepi and the Noma crew. He tries to make us feel like that's part of the Redzepi modus operandi, this spur of the moment joie de vivre but that's not the full story. While Redzepi has a relentless drive to innovate, experiment and grow, he still makes calculated decisions. Gordinier has projected his own chaotic life onto the Noma crew when if he looked closer he'd see there's ruthless and laser focused ambition motivating each person he details. It's these chef's life work, their careers, their entire livelihoods. Unlike Gordinier, they aren't just hopping on a jet to Mexico for shits and giggles.

Gordinier also starts early on the comparisons to music (a topic he's clearly thought about a lot more than cooking). With his musings on Bach's counterpoint and Redzepi having a kind of synaesthesia where he plays flavours as notes you could be fooled into thinking Redzepi is just all about pseudo-intellectual babble. Instead Gordinier tells us that all pro chefs are chasing simplicity. Ideas that all needed a lot more thought. Gordinier also briefly touches on the eras of chefs from Marco Pierre-White through to Redzepi but again leaves the topic for someone with more skill and thought to address.

Another cardinal sin of this book is that despite forking out for a dozen or so photos to be embedded in the text Gordinier made the strange decision to not include a single shot of one of Noma's dishes. Instead we get a dozen photos of various people in the Redzepi clique none of which really add anything to the story. The writer waxes lyrical about each of the life changing dishes and then doesn't use the opportunity to put any pictures in. Seems a strange decision to me.

The whole book was seemingly unedited, Gordinier just chucked each memory into the pot and without stirring hoped it would taste good. I just wish he'd tasted it before serving.

[Brandi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jeff Gordinier's "Hungry: Eating, Road-Tripping, and Risking It All with the Greatest Chef in the World" is quite an interesting read. Since it's part travelogue, and I really enjoy them, I quite enjoyed this book. I had never heard of Chef Redzepi before this book (I'm not much of a foodie) but he seems like quite an interesting character. I do wish the book was a bit longer, it is a rather quick read.

I really enjoyed Gordinier's writing style and would not hesitate to buy more books of his in the future. My copy of this book was obtained from a Goodreads giveaway and I appreciate the opportunity to read and review it.

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I won an ARC in a Goodreads giveaway; this did not influence my review.

Gordinier is an extremely intelligent writer but I found this book to be unfocused. One problem is that it seemed as if Gordinier never decided how, or if, to include himself in this book. At times he writes about chefs and food as an impartial observer, and it is easy to forget that he partook in their outings and meals. At other times, he shares small fragments of his own life - the fallout of his failed marriage or his willingness to spend his own money to join chef Redzepi on various adventures. The book is not a memoir, and not a biography of Redzepi. While Redzepi's restaurant, Noma, is a recurring theme it is not the sole focus, either. In addition, the book covers a span of four years, but it is often hard to track the passage of time. I enjoyed the passages about food (though there were fewer than I expected), and some of the sections about sourcing ingredients were fascinating, but I found this to be an odd book overall. Still, it is a quick read for those interested in learning more about one of the most esteemed chefs, or about his restaurant that was once considered the best in the world.

[Clarke · Rating 5 out of 5]

intoxicating, if you love flavors, sourcing, thinking different about food

[zhixin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hungry is such an exhilarating ride from start to end.

Ex-NYT food writer Jeff Gordinier, while struggling to get over the breakdown of his marriage, is invited by Rene Redzepi to accompany him on his as-good-as spiritual quest to bring the Noma ideology to the world, summarised as follows: "he made terroir -- the soil, the climate, and the land that shape the flavor of the plant and the animal that eats it... the entire point of his cuisine." Noma is, with its revolutionary take on food, currently one of the best restaurants in the world, and you'll be hard-pressed not to join its cult after this book.

For what comes through isn't just downright drool-worthy descriptions of food, although there is an abundance of that. What mesmerises Gordinier, and hence the reader, is the sheer drive and work ethic of Redzepi, who conjures concoctions -- and restaurants -- out of literal ruins. He scours forests, beaches, seas and unhesitatingly puts foraged material into his mouth, a frightening idea to the urban dweller disconnected from nature (read: me).

And then alchemy happens: raw ingredients are ground, pickled, sliced, pound, combined in previously unimagined ways; hours, days, months (and years?) go into individual dishes as animals or crops grow, fermentation transforms an item into a desired end state, and chefs meticulously distill ingredients to their purest form. When you finally read about a dish, you feel sure that it must come closest to a platonic ideal of deliciousness after learning about the process to procure its individual parts, what with diving into the chilliest of oceans, picking weeds from stark jutting cliffs, or returning to local farmers again and again to refine the growing process. In the hands of Redzepi, food-making is elevated into an art of the highest form.

As Gordinier attempts to pick up the pieces of his life, he learns that yielding to Redzepi's force of character -- despite the spanner it throws into the gears of his existing lifestyle, what with having to settle his children, book last minute flights and accommodation, even quit his job -- is giving him a much-needed injection of elixir. A form of escapism, a see-what-comes attitude born out of a kind of desperation at hitting a wall, Gordinier regains his hunger for life from Redzepi's infectious energy.

He's not the only one. Redzepi extends invitations to various individuals including Mission Chinese Food's chef Danny Bowien, recently hit by food-poisoning scandals, to join him in food-hunting at far-flung locations in Mexico and Australia. Hungry isn't just a story about Redzepi's perfectionist tendencies in having control over his food from farm to table. It is also about his generosity in including people in his life, giving them a well-timed gesture of encouragement. It is very much about the people, and how Redzepi tries his darnedest not to overlook human matters while moving the world with his restaurant.

For me personally, Hungry made me want to broaden my palette and dive deeper into whatever cuisines I have the fortune to come across. Mexican cuisine starred largely in the book, stoking the fire of my curiosity and appetite towards a food culture I did not have much previous exposure or interest. What with watching Ugly Delicious and reading this book, I feel like there is a universe of flavours I have yet to access, and I'm bloody excited to try.

[Catherine Woodman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read a review of this book in The Week a few weeks ago when I was catching up on back issues, which seems to be the way that I attack a weekly magazine these days--consuming a month or so of them in one sitting, and then adding all sorts of things I want to read to my library hold list as a result. That is how this book ended up on my list of things to read.

I like reading about food and food preparation, but by and large, haven't got a lot of experience in this arena, and I probably wouldn't have thought that a book about Rene Redzepi's creative process would exactly be up my alley, but I really enjoyed this book about the architect of New Nordic cuisine, with what might be considered the fermenting bible having come out of his kitchen at Noma in Copenhagen to his credit.

the thing I loved about him to start with is that he loves regional Mexican cooking, and that is undeniably the best complex flavored food i have ever had. One point he makes in his journey around the world and his return to Mexico is that there really is no improving on the flavors of the foods made all over Mexico, that they harness the potential of everything around them and make it soar. the book is short and largely sweet, and well worth a read if cooking is your thing.

[Joanne Clarke Gunter · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great read if you enjoy reading about renowned chefs and the obsessions that drive them. In this book, the author chronicles four years spent traveling with renowned chef Rene Redzepi, whose restaurant, Noma, in Copenhagen has been labeled by the culinary world as the best in the world. Their travels were spent searching for the most tantalizing flavors and foods for Rene to incorporate into his new Noma restaurants, especially the planned Noma Mexico restaurant. And oh boy the foods prepared by chefs and home cooks in Mexico will make your mouth water. And it was interesting to learn that, Rene Redzepi, he of international chefdom fame, has not mastered the art of making the perfect tortilla even after repeatedly trying to do so.

[Craig Werner · Rating 4 out of 5]

High-end celebrity cooking as jazz improvisation. Gordinier spent four or five years circling around Rene Redzepi, whose Copenhagen restaurant was recognized world's best. Following that, Redzepi tore it all down and rebuilt it several times, in Japan, Australia, and Mexico before returning to a new location in Denmark. I can only dimly imagine some/most of the tastes but the sense of creative engagement comes through clearly and Gordinier's writing is frequently hilarious. Some points where I wanted more detail--we never really learn how Redzepi avoided disaster in Mexico--but a fun read.

[Julie Tedjeske Crane · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this because the author is speaking at a local lecture series and I have a ticket. It was an odd book. Mostly it was a profile of René Redzepi, a famous chef. But honestly, I could not tell you what the point of the book was; it was very disjointed. In fact, the only reason the book merits three stars is that Redzepi seems like a genuinely interesting guy. (I think he was also profiled on an episode of Parts Unknown--I'd watch that before reading this book.)

[Cal Harris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jeff Gordinier takes the reader along for the journey to Mexico, Copenhagen, Australia, and beyond in Hungry.

The world’s greatest chef - René Redzepi’s eccentricity, charisma, and appetite to evolve shines on every page.

[Colleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun quick read that I got at a cookbook store in Seattle. No regrets.

[Jørgen Hegstad · Rating 5 out of 5]

Uhyre velskrevet for og av en restaurant- og matentusiast. Elsket den.

[Ashley Bloom · Rating 3 out of 5]

Super fascinating exploration of unique culinary endeavors around the world, but I couldn’t handle an entire book about a rich cis straight man pursuing his dreams.

[Nela · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great one! Well written. I've particularly enjoyed the parts happening in México. It's a book about Noma and the team behind it.

[Tom Kaye · Rating 5 out of 5]

Inspiring.

[Caitlin Gugliotta · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this book because it was a quick and easy read. I need help getting out of my reading slump.

[Bryna Jekogian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I looooved this subject matter (a New York Times food writer follows along the adventures of the founder and head chef at Noma in Copenhagen). It was the perfect read for my trip to Denmark.

[Dominic Nelhams · Rating 4 out of 5]

makes you want to do what you do better

[Kathryn Best · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredibly well written.

[Lex · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an interesting read! Part memoir and part biography, I enjoyed the insights into Rene Redzepi's mind, the travelogue vibe, and the fun foraging facts.