The Kamogawa Food Detectives, Hisashi Kashiwai – book review

I picked up this book while out with my family at the weekend. I had wanted to read The Kamogawa Food Detectives for a while, but I’m so glad I got the book rather than the audible edition. I’ll explain why later.

The Kamogawa Food Detectives

The Blurb

What’s the one dish you’d do anything to taste just one more time?

Down a quiet backstreet in Kyoto exists a very special restaurant. Run by Koishi Kamogawa and her father Nagare, the Kamogawa Diner treats its customers to wonderfully extravagant meals. But that’s not the main reason to stop by . . .

The father-daughter duo have started advertising their services as ‘food detectives’. Through ingenious investigations, they are capable of recreating a dish from their customers’ pasts – dishes that may well hold the keys to unlocking forgotten memories and future happiness.

From the widower looking for a specific noodle dish that his wife used to cook, to a first love’s beef stew, the restaurant of lost recipes provides a link to the past – and a way to a more contented future.

My Review of The Kamogawa Food Detectives

I absolutely devoured this book! But first a warning, it’s a Japanese author and if you are unfamiliar with Japanese food and traditions you may find it a little strange, or difficult to understand.

My older children developed a love of all things Japanese over 20 years ago and although none of us have been to Japan we are familiar with a lot of traditions and a lot of food. I had very little problem recognising a lot of the recipes and ingredients mentioned.

It’s not a cook book though, it’s a book of memories. People find this little restaurant and then tell what recipe they are trying to find. And interview with the daughter Koishi in the back room of the restaurant gives them the chance to tell their story. Then her father, Nagare, goes above and behind to find the ingredients required and re-create the dish for the customer.

It’s such a sweet story, split into six chapters, each representing a customer and their chosen dish.

Is there a dish that brings back memories for you that you’d like re-created? It made me think of my nan’s mince pies she would make at Christmas. The table would be covered with her ingredients as she made the pastry, rolled it out, filled the pies and baked them to perfection. They were then collected by family members near and far. Everyone came for nan’s mince pies, and try as I might I’ve never been able to re-create them. Ask anyone in my family who is old enough to remember my nan (who passed in 1996) and they will tell you about her mince pies.

But I digress, the dishes in this book are Japanese, even the beef stew, and they may not be familiar recipes. But, as a lover of Japanese food I would be willing to try them. That’s why I’m happy I have the book. I can look back and maybe try some for myself. Of course I can’t go to Japan and source the same ingredients as Nagare but I can try my own versions. The book has inspired me.

Also, I will never get the chance to visit Japan but I’ve looked at a lot of the places mentioned in the book, especially around kyoto where the Kamogawa restaurant is. There are mentions of temples and streets and I have found myself on Google Maps taking a tour and looking a photos. My eldest daughter has promised I can do the tour with her VR headset so I’m looking forward to that. I can’t go to Japan but I can bring Japan to my living room.

I think you can tell, I’m a big fan of this book and I’m eagerly awaiting the second in the series The Restaurant of Lost Recipes in April next year.

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