The restaurateur chronicling hardships of immigrant staff in US kitchens: ‘These are the stories that make it work’

In Voices from the Kitchen, Marc Meyer pulls the curtain back on the harrowing journeys of the people who run his restaurantsThroughout his lifetime, the celebrated chef and author Anthony Bourdain was unequivocal in his belief that the restaurant industry in the US could not function without immigrant labor. These indispensable workers, Bourdain argued, were not only willing to do the jobs that most US-born citizens would look down upon, but also they did them better and faster.“People have differing opinions on what we should do about immigration in the future,” Bourdain told the Houston Press in 2007. “But let’s be honest, at least, about who is cooking in America now. Who we rely on – have relied on – for decades. The bald fact is that the entire restaurant industry in America would close down overnight, would never recover, if current immigration laws were enforced quickly and thoroughly across the board.” Continue reading...