Anthony Bourdain continued his tour of Places The Ritters Have Lived this week with an episode filmed in Prague. I thoroughly enjoyed all but the 10 minutes where he decided it was necessary that we witness wanton violence against pig parts. *shudder* In all, it was excellent to see so many places that we knew well (U Medviku, including the beloved Topinky!) and funny that we actually knew more places and people in the episode than we did in the one Bourdain filmed in Livingston last year.
During the pig dismemberment section, I was really torn. One the one hand, guts! I can't watch so much! Bleah! On the other hand, the piggatoir was being led by one Christopher Robertson, founder of Bacon.cz, who used to deliver English-style bacon and sausage directly to my apartment when he first launched. Pork delivery! For serious!
I see by visiting his website that he now has two shops in Prague. That is awesome. Because I remember going to the hair salon to pick up my bacon. The salon owner, a South African named Mark Phillip Gravell, loved Chris' products and served as an ersatz distribution center for the expats who lived in Vinohrady. I don't think anyone was ever not confused when I would mention that I had to go Hair by Mark Phillip to pick up some sausage.
But that's the way it was then, in the olden days of the early 2000s, in Prague. Expats still passed around culinary secrets like they were jewels, and you often had to leave the country to get the spices you wanted or certain ingredients. I totally smuggled in cheddar from Scotland and sun-dried tomatoes from Italy. It made it more fun somehow.
Seeing Anthony Bourdain wander around a place where it seems that all of that is available and more made me realize just how much things have probably changed since we left five years ago. At least U Medviku is still serving up lard-fried bread and rapid-fire beers. And the street sausages on Vaclavske Namesti still looked as disgusting as ever. Hopefully, some things will never change.
