Anthony Bourdain Used To Wear A Disguise To Get This Fast Food Meal

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When in Paris, Anthony Bourdain's favorite restaurant was Le Dôme Café, an upscale brasserie. Never let it be said, however, that this late, great chef and wordsmith had uppity tastes. He once threatened to burst into song after eating at Waffle House, dubbing the chain better than fine dining, and he had an insatiable love for a very particular, polarizing guilty pleasure: fast food mac and cheese.

On a nearly 10-year-old Reddit AMA thread, Bourdain spilled the beans about his passion for mac: "During the morning I get these horrendous cravings for Popeyes mac and cheese, and, uh, I will often disguise myself to try to slip into Popeyes. Or in a pinch, I will even go to the Colonel. There, I admit it." Speaking with People, he admitted that, after a long stint in Asia eating local fare, "I will weep with gratitude at macaroni and cheese" — once again, from Popeyes, his favorite fast food chicken chain. 

In a joint interview with Jacques Pépin at the 92nd St. Y, Bourdain once again came around to the topic of masked fast food runs. "I will admit that I will sometimes put a hooded sweatshirt on and I will sneak into Popeyes Fried Chicken, and it's not even for the chicken; it's for that nasty macaroni and cheese, " he said. "And there's not even anything resembling cheese [...] that nuclear orange stuff, and it's microwaved. I... I just love that stuff." If you don't laugh at the image of Anthony Bourdain's noble silver head swathed in a hoodie as he skulks into a Popeyes, perhaps your sense of humor is broken. 

Bourdain, true to his unpretentious character, strove for simplicity even in his own mac and cheese, eschewing fancy ingredients. In his 2016 classic, "Appetites: A Cookbook," Bourdain spilled the beans on his preferred recipe. Unsurprisingly for an accomplished chef, it features real cheese, not orange mystery matter. What it doesn't do, however, is gild the lily. In a foreward to the recipe (via The Splendid Table), Bourdain takes a potshot at those who would try to pull off an upmarket mac: "Get that d**n lobster out of my mac and cheese! Truffles do not make it better. If you add truffle oil, which is made from a petroleum-based chemical additive and the crushed dreams of nineties culinary mediocrity, you should be punched in the kidneys." What Bourdain did endorse was a little julienned ham, but even that was optional. He let four types of cheese do the talking, combining them in a simple béchamel enhanced only by cayenne, mustard, and Worcestershire sauce.

In 2012, a snippy writer for Alabama's AL.com took sides on Bourdain's at-the-time beef with fellow celebrity chef Paula Deen, arguing that Deen really knew her stuff when it came to rib-sticking mac and cheese, and Bourdain, with his well-documented love for fast food mac, clearly did not. Bourdain's response to the jab — if, indeed, he deigned to issue one at all — is lost to history, but we can bet that he'd go down swinging for his glorious Popeyes side dish. "Real" mac and cheese is a snob's concept, and Bourdain was many things ... but never a snob.