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Washoku FTW
5 years ago
General
https://www.amazon.com/OISHINBO-JAPANESE-CUISINE-Tetsu-Kariya/dp/1421521393/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2E0AB0M3MCL6J&dchild=1&keywords=oishinbo&qid=1612760243&s=books&sprefix=oishinbo%2Caps%2C227&sr=1-1
https://www.amazon.com/What-Did-You-Yesterday-Vol-ebook/dp/B08547QSYM/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2UNVZVYN46ACS&dchild=1&keywords=what+did+you+eat+yesterday&qid=1612760285&s=books&sprefix=what+did+you+%2Cstripbooks%2C206&sr=1-1
Can you love food without fetishizing it? Of two manga series I'm now enjoying, one smiles and gently sidesteps my question; the other finds me unworthy of an answer.
The latter series, OISHINBO, is a well-intentioned, didactic manga utterly convinced that the soul of a people is expressed as much through its cuisine as its fine arts -- a view both cosmopolitan and nationalistic. An ongoing series since 1983, OISHINBO's simplistically-rendered human characters and photorealistic drawings of food, drink, and architecture reflect the strip's elevation of aesthetics above all else. This manga is obsessed with the philosophical question, "What is Japanese cuisine?" (and with the deeper question, "What is Japan?"); its characters are plot functions who don't grow, change, or evolve, though the strip has run for decades. Journalists Yamaoka and Kurita, the Holmes and Watson of haute cuisine, exist to show the background characters -- their stooges -- how learning to properly prepare and appreciate Japanese cuisine can heal their souls; their Moriarty, Yamaoka's impossibly demanding father Kaibara, exists to humiliate his son at every opportunity.
But as I said, I'm enjoying this series. The English translation consists of seven volumes of highlights from the 111-volume series, which is probably as much of OISHINBO as any non-Japanese reader needs. I've never seen a bowl of ramen, a slice of sashimi, or a cup of sake look so enticing in the comics as they do here. This manga won't teach you how to cook, but it'll renew your appreciation for the appearance, aroma, and taste of good food and drink.
The series I'm enjoying even more (well, a lot more) is Fumi Yoshinaga's WHAT DID YOU EAT YESTERDAY? (2007 - ongoing), a recipe manga free of any highfalutin' notions of culinary idealism. Food in this series is what brings people together -- specifically, a middle-aged gay couple, Kenji and Shiro, and their circle of friends, co-workers, and parents, characters who make up this manga's small but richly observed world.
Each character has a distinct personality, and one of the two great pleasures of this series is that we get to know them so well over the course of a series in which nothing remotely melodramatic happens, that an awkward dinner for four friends talking at cross-purposes results in a panel of exquisitely painful high comedy, and decisions made in one chapter can have an emotionally devastating payoff several volumes later. The other great pleasure is the centerpiece of each chapter, the preparation of a delicious, healthy, and fairly elaborate gourmet meal, using only cheap, commonplace ingredients (commonplace in the Japanese kitchen, that is). The reader learns to appreciate the stimulating variety of flavors in a well-balanced meal and the astonishing versatility of miso soups and veggie sides, as well as how to synchronize the prep and cooking times of three or four different dishes in a small kitchen.
Everyone in WDYEY ages in more-or-less real time, making us more aware of how our dietary needs change as we get older; not something that OISHINBO really cares about. The drawings are functional rather than eyecatching, but that's fine. Two manga that I like, then: one the epitome of the fine dining experience, one pure comfort food. Only one of them needs a reminder that food is part of life, not its purpose.
https://www.amazon.com/What-Did-You-Yesterday-Vol-ebook/dp/B08547QSYM/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2UNVZVYN46ACS&dchild=1&keywords=what+did+you+eat+yesterday&qid=1612760285&s=books&sprefix=what+did+you+%2Cstripbooks%2C206&sr=1-1
Can you love food without fetishizing it? Of two manga series I'm now enjoying, one smiles and gently sidesteps my question; the other finds me unworthy of an answer.
The latter series, OISHINBO, is a well-intentioned, didactic manga utterly convinced that the soul of a people is expressed as much through its cuisine as its fine arts -- a view both cosmopolitan and nationalistic. An ongoing series since 1983, OISHINBO's simplistically-rendered human characters and photorealistic drawings of food, drink, and architecture reflect the strip's elevation of aesthetics above all else. This manga is obsessed with the philosophical question, "What is Japanese cuisine?" (and with the deeper question, "What is Japan?"); its characters are plot functions who don't grow, change, or evolve, though the strip has run for decades. Journalists Yamaoka and Kurita, the Holmes and Watson of haute cuisine, exist to show the background characters -- their stooges -- how learning to properly prepare and appreciate Japanese cuisine can heal their souls; their Moriarty, Yamaoka's impossibly demanding father Kaibara, exists to humiliate his son at every opportunity.
But as I said, I'm enjoying this series. The English translation consists of seven volumes of highlights from the 111-volume series, which is probably as much of OISHINBO as any non-Japanese reader needs. I've never seen a bowl of ramen, a slice of sashimi, or a cup of sake look so enticing in the comics as they do here. This manga won't teach you how to cook, but it'll renew your appreciation for the appearance, aroma, and taste of good food and drink.
The series I'm enjoying even more (well, a lot more) is Fumi Yoshinaga's WHAT DID YOU EAT YESTERDAY? (2007 - ongoing), a recipe manga free of any highfalutin' notions of culinary idealism. Food in this series is what brings people together -- specifically, a middle-aged gay couple, Kenji and Shiro, and their circle of friends, co-workers, and parents, characters who make up this manga's small but richly observed world.
Each character has a distinct personality, and one of the two great pleasures of this series is that we get to know them so well over the course of a series in which nothing remotely melodramatic happens, that an awkward dinner for four friends talking at cross-purposes results in a panel of exquisitely painful high comedy, and decisions made in one chapter can have an emotionally devastating payoff several volumes later. The other great pleasure is the centerpiece of each chapter, the preparation of a delicious, healthy, and fairly elaborate gourmet meal, using only cheap, commonplace ingredients (commonplace in the Japanese kitchen, that is). The reader learns to appreciate the stimulating variety of flavors in a well-balanced meal and the astonishing versatility of miso soups and veggie sides, as well as how to synchronize the prep and cooking times of three or four different dishes in a small kitchen.
Everyone in WDYEY ages in more-or-less real time, making us more aware of how our dietary needs change as we get older; not something that OISHINBO really cares about. The drawings are functional rather than eyecatching, but that's fine. Two manga that I like, then: one the epitome of the fine dining experience, one pure comfort food. Only one of them needs a reminder that food is part of life, not its purpose.
But I'm biased. I wrote an extensive story about a chef whose personal identity got tangled up in the food he made because he thought he was becoming just a tool. And in a short segment concerning a nation that had been invaded by a wildly ideologically opposed enemy the idea of their old food became somewhat paramount as there were multiple cultural genocide threads at work, including official excoriation and destruction of even the idea of the old foods. Eating something as simple as a slice of cake is as good as a declaration of war.
Obviously this is highly contextual Maybe I said too much. You seem grumpy about pretty food and questions of depth concerning identity.
If I'm "grumpy" (?) about anything, it's about a manga in which characterization places a distant second to the author's ideology -- the reader is getting a series of essays (at worst, polemics) disguised as storytelling. (You might've missed OISHINBO's six-part story arc about the near-impossibility of finding a good bottle of nihonshu in Japan...)
I don't think I'm poo-pooing the ideas of personal expression or cultural genocide; I'm arguing that one of these manga is more interesting to read than the other.
https://www.fimfiction.net/story/31.....t-a-changeling
https://www.fimfiction.net/story/13.....nusual-suspect