Cool Japan: Cafeterias and home cooking

 ■ Cool Japan: Cafeterias and home cooking

The “Cafeteria” episode from NHK’s Cool Japan

There is no other country in the world with as many international restaurants as Japan. No country has as many French and Italian flags fluttering in the streets. Tokyo has three times the number of Michelin-starred restaurants than Paris. There are many reasons for this.

Communication

Japanese restaurants place importance on entertainment and communication with the customer. The benches at sushi restaurants are calculated to be of a width that makes communication with the chef as easy as possible. 

Showing the cooking process

The three pinnacles of Japanese cuisine are sushi, tempura and soba. They all trace their roots to standing-only roadside stalls where food is prepared right in front of customers. This has the effect of building trust with the customer about what ingredients are used and how they are prepared. Japanese outlets of an American fried chicken chain were the subject of much chatter as they are the only ones where the cooking process is made visible.

Chain restaurants

Japanese diners expect that the flavor at a chain restaurant will be the same no matter at which restaurant they eat. The flavor of the food is rigorously standardized in the central kitchen. There are chain restaurants in most countries, but a characteristic of Japan is our effort and innovation, which makes it possible to make not just fast food but also cuisine such as Japanese and Italian, which have many complicated dishes.

Restaurant magazines

There have been guidebooks on cafeterias ever since the time of pilgrimages to Ise Shrine in the Edo Period. We have long believed the information written in these guidebooks. Comments, which can be left online by anyone, are of course useful. But information derived from professional research is trustworthy and worth the price tag. This has ensured the popularity of guidebooks.

The ‘Home Cooking’ episode

Perhaps it is due to the negative business conditions, but eating at home is experiencing something of a boom. This is something that has developed with a long history. Japanese cuisine prepared at restaurants is popular around the world. Despite my doubts about whether home cooking can really be ‘cool,’ this is a theme I would like to suggest. 

Overflowing supermarkets

Since the Kamakura Period, Japanese home cooking consisted of one soup and three vegetables. From its very origins it was extremely varied. It also incorporated things from around the world. The evolution of the distribution system brought in new ingredients which were used in cooking. Moreover, everyone cooks. This is all supported by careful service provision at supermarkets. This is certainly ‘Cool Japan.’ 

Websites for posting recipes

Only in Japan could these websites be so popular. There must be no other country in the world where housewives are so concerned about what to make for dinner. What’s more, Japan has one of the highest rates of internet usage, with the world’s largest per-capita amount of posted information. Everyone shares information, improves upon it, and creates their own food. This is very Japanese. 

School cooking classes

Cooking involved a lot of tasks — selecting ingredients, cutting them, putting them together, serving and cleaning up afterwards. It is quite tough. It is a way to come to an understanding of how one’s country’s culture and ingredients are made and how hard parents have to work to provide what students feel comes as a matter of course. Learning in this way allows for the discovery of things that children wouldn't normally notice.