Nice guys will always finish last while Anthony Bourdain is on the scene. If you don't the know the chef turned best-selling author and Travel Channel host, than you've been missing out. Bourdain brought gonzo to the kitchen, or out of the kitchen as the case may be. His first tome Kitchen Confidential was a Hunter S. Thompson-inspired machismo trip through the world of haute cuisine. Chefs are bad asses in Bourdain's world of sex, drugs and rock and roll. They are the magic men (and the occasional woman) who conjure the sacred from the profane. The journey between the raw and the cooked is not for the feint of heart.

Now that Bourdain's got a few seasons at the Travel Channel under his belt, it's no surprise that he should feel compelled to hold forth on the relative merits of food on television.