Anthony Bourdain was a friend and mentor: Joe Bastianich

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As someone who shared a close relationship with Anthony Bourdain, celebrity chef Joe Bastianich says it is still difficult to process his suicide earlier this month.

Bastianich says it is undebatable that Bourdain's legacy is great but his death needs to spark a debate on mental health issues.

"Anthony was a friend and mentor of mine for many years and I'm still kind of processing his loss. I haven't really said anything because I don't really know what to say. It's kind of unspeakable. I think another thing about Anthony and his great legacy, about everything he did, is that this is really an opportunity to talk about mental health issues and people with darkness and depression. That's really the conversation," he told PTI in a telephonic interview from New York.

A beloved chef, writer and TV personality, Bourdain committed suicide on June 8 at the age of 61. He was found unresponsive in his hotel room in Strasbourg, France, where he was shooting for the new season of his CNN food and travel series "Parts Unknown".

From sharing a bread baker to helping him write his memoir, Bourdain was a special friend for the Bastianich, who runs a chain of restaurants around the world including 1 Michelin star Babbo in New York.

Bastianich, 49, has fond memories of Bourdain and said he even wrote a chapter in Bourdain's first book "Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly" (2000).

"When I wrote my memoir 'Restaurant Man', I sat with him for many lunches and he really advised me. I was trying to write something very honest and personal. He was a great mentor in how to get on a page things that are so personal to you. He helped me edit and bring to the page the power and impact that it should have and being centred in the proper way."