If you’re a fan of Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations, then you might be interested to know that reruns of his first television series, A Cook’s Tour, are also airing this winter on Tuesday nights on the Food Network.

It’s fun to catch an episode of A Cook’s Tour after seeing No Reservations on the Travel Channel the night before (on Monday) as a kind of before-and-after television viewing experience. A Cook’s Tour was shot in 2000 and 2001 when Bourdain was a serious chain smoker, a skinnier guy with darker hair, and much more of a novice at this TV thing. The witty, philosophical and insightfully humorous banter that rolls of his tongue in No Reservations, the kind of language that made his book Kitchen Confidential so popular, is mostly missing from A Cook’s Tour's narration.

In December Bourdain blogged about being taken aback and disgusted when he got the memo that A Cook’s Tour was going to be revived. Or, as he put it: “This was like being unexpectedly groped and publicly slipped the tongue by the ugliest girl at the prom.” Ouch!

Bourdain’s been a tough critic of the Food Network for years, since before and after his show A Cook's Tour aired. The jabs are fewer and further apart these days, though, as the guy must be softening in his older years. Though they do continue to a degree on his show No Reservations. Just last week, in the emotional New Orleans episode, in an interview with Emeril Lagasse at his restaurant, Bourdain apologized in a roundabout way for making fun of him for all those years, but then said that Rachael Ray "still sucks." Zing!

I'm not sure who gets the last laugh with the Food Network having the rights to air A Cook's Tour all over again -- as it means the network is capitalizing on Bourdain's growing popularity years after he stopped working with them; but it also gives the bad boy of cuisine even more publicity and air time.

Last night on No Reservations there were no jabs at the Food Network though, as Bourdain brought us to London and Edinburgh in a quest to answer the question: “Why the bad reputation for food?” While no one was sure how British cuisine went down a downward spiral for most of the twentieth century; it was agreed that it's on its way back these days. The guy credited with starting this comeback is Marco Pierre White, the original "celebrity chef," who at the young age of 33 (in 1994) had earned three Michelin stars. With long curly hair and a rock star demeanor, White's the guy who inspired Bourdain in the late '80s to think that there was room for a new kind of chef -- a young, sexy, creative, and rebellious figure.

As hunting has become quite a theme on No Reservations this season, it became so again last night. Last night the head of Bourdain's kill -- a cute Bambi-like deer -- from an excursion with White was brought to the dining room table (at Yew Tree Inn) and sat there on a plate staring at Bourdain while he feasted on its fresh liver. Before this horror movie scene, Bourdain ate a series of White's "greatest hits" dishes -- Quail's eggs with hollandaise sauce, roast venison, Omelette Arnold Bennett, and roast partridge with bacon, sausages, chestnuts, brussel sprouts, and bread sauce.

While visiting England Bourdain ate pig's head soup three times; though his favorite seemed to be at St. John Bread and Wine, where he also indulged in English blood cake topped by a fried egg and roasted bone marrow with toasted bread, parsley caper salad, and a little sea salt, in other words, his "current death row meal." Bourdain also visited Smithfield Market, an 800-year-old massive butcher shop in the middle of the city, whose existence is now threatened by the rise of supermarket chains in London.

Bourdain then traveled to Edinburgh, Scotland, on a trip he likened to Michael Caine's badass hiatus in Get Carter; this was a cute comparison, as Bourdain's reason for his trip was not to avenge a death (as it was Carter's) but to find out where Scottish cuisine is at these days. Once in Edinburgh, he dined on deep-fried haggis and Irn-Bru, a hangover cure of a soda, with novelist and buddy, Ian Rankin. Then together they dined at a new upscale restaurant in Leith, the district on the docks where Trainspotting was based, where it became clear that Scotland is developing into a sophisticated destination for cuisine.

Should you have the chance to tune in to tonight's A Cook's Tour - "Childhood Flavors," you can see Bourdain in Europe again. This time in Arcachon, France, the town where his father is from and where he first discovered his love for food.

Next Monday the Travel Channel will air a No Reservations President's Day marathon followed by a new episode on Jamaica at 10:00 PM (ET).

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