A Wonderfully Uplifting Book

In the book blurb for The Kamogawa Food Detectives by Hisashi Kashiwai a question is posed: What’s the one dish you’d do anything to taste just one more time? I flashed back to the Disney film “Ratatouille,” where the famous curmudgeonly food critic shows up at the rat chef’s restaurant, fully not expecting what he receives. He was instantly transported into his past; upon his first bite of the humble Provence vegetable stew dish, he closed his eyes and as his taste buds absorbed flavors the old man had not experienced since he last sat at his mother’s kitchen table as a boy eating her ratatouille, every detail of those moments crystallized in his mind, the feeling of receiving a favorite dish, thoughtfully prepared by the woman who loved him first, infused him with all the warmth and happiness associated with revisiting that childhood memory, awakened with one lift of his fork. 

Visitors to the Kamogawa Food Detectives have similar experiences. Koishi Kamogawa and her father Nagare run a small restaurant with the food detective agency office in the back. People who want a favorite recipe tracked down, for a variety of different reasons, seek them out. Asuka has come to them hoping they can locate a spaghetti and hot dog dish she ate on a trip with her grandfather when she was 5 years old. Her grandfather is now living in a nursing home where his dementia can better be cared for than in their busy family. She gives them what clues she can remember, and days later they call her back for a tasting. 

When she walks into the restaurant to sample the recipe Nagare has hunted down, the author describes the scene, “Asuka worked some of it into a forkful of spaghetti, then inserted the whole thing into her mouth. ‘What a combination!’ she said to herself. Tears were running down her cheeks. Her thoughts turned to memories of her grandfather. Her primary school entrance ceremony–and after that, middle and high school too. He’d always been the one who was there for her–not her mother or father, but Chichiro. Her grandfather. ‘Looks like we got it right, then?’ asked Nagare, emerging from the kitchen. ‘Yep,’ Asuka replied simply as she dabbed at her cheeks with a handkerchief.” She asks the cook Nagare a question before leaving, “‘Why do you think I remember that spaghetti in particular, out of all the other dishes I ate with Grandad?’ ‘Well, this is just a guess, but . . .’ Nagare paused and took a breath. ‘I wonder if this trip was the first time your grandfather treated you like a grown-up.’ Asuka’s eyes widened in surprise. ‘Until then, you’d probably always just been given whatever everyone else was having. But this trip marked the beginning of your life as an individual, and that plate of spaghetti was the proof. Your own meal, all to yourself–right there in front of you. You must have been over the moon.’”

During the course of the book six different people seek out the services of the detective agency. I think author Hisashi Kashiwai saved the best for last. A self made successful businessman comes seeking a childhood comfort food his mother often made him before her untimely death; his father married the mother’s carer shortly after, and he resents the way he perceives he was treated by his stepmother. As he leaves upon completion of their arrangement, not only has he tasted the results of his heart’s desire, but the successful young man has learned a lesson that seems to have changed him for the better.

This is such a great concept for a storyline, made all the more improbable by virtue of the fact the author worked as a dentist in Kyoto most of his life. It is a wonderfully uplifting book, and will make readers reflect on their own lives.