Chef Who Found Anthony Bourdain Dead Remembers His "Loyal" Friend

Éric Ripert said he never saw anyone "so generous" with their fans like the star.

As the year comes to a close, Anthony Bourdain's memory lives on. 

The beloved chef and TV personality committed suicide in June, sending shockwaves through his many fans and friends around the world. Among them was fellow revered chef Éric Ripert, who found Bourdain unresponsive in his hotel room in France, where the Parts Unknown host had been working on an upcoming episode. 

While Bourdain is no longer with us, Ripert's memory of him remains crystal clear. "Anthony was a very loyal friend, very noble, very generous with his fans," he told Hoda Kotb and Craig Melvin on Today Friday. 

"I have never seen someone so generous and spending so much time with them, signing books, taking pictures everywhere in the street or when he was doing book signings, you would see a line with a thousand people and until the last one, he would stay there," the Le Bernardin chef remembered. 

Of course, anyone who knew Bourdain can't talk about him with acknowledging the impact he made on viewers through his travel shows. 

"He was very curious. We were with him on television. He was taking us on his trips," Ripert pointed out. "His curiosity was contagious."

As the chef poignantly concluded, "We traveled the world with Anthony."

His work on the show was posthumously honored this year with two 2018 Emmy Awards—one for Outstanding Writing for Nonfiction Programming and another for Outstanding Informational Series or Special. 

(E! and NBC are both part of the NBCUniversal family.)