Appetite, 1998, 30, 117128

A Note on the Making of Culinary Traditionan Example of

Modern Japan
KATARZYNA CWIERTKA
Centre for Japanese and Korean Studies, Leiden University,
The Netherlands
This article deals with the transition of Japanese food culture in the late nineteenth
and the rst half of the twentieth century. It explains the three main stages of
this transition, namely the adoption of Western haute cuisine by the Japanese
elite, the diusion of Western ingredients, dishes and cookery techniques among
the urban middle class, and the popularization of the new JapaneseWestern
hybrid cuisine by the military. This new cuisine began to acquire the status of
culinary tradition from the 1950s onwards. Dietary changes in modern Japan
were to a large extent a consequence of deliberate policies of the government. In
the early stage, Westernization of the elites diet was regarded as necessary in
order to achieve a status of a civilized nation. Later, deliberate dietary reforms
were undertaken with the aim of improving physical conditions of the population.
These deliberate actions were directly inuenced by the political circumstances in
which Japan found itself in the period discussed.
1998 Academic Press Limited
IN1onic1ioN
Tradition means, in the most elementary sense, anything that is transmitted or
handed down from the past to the present (Shils, 1981). In the particular sense of
culinary tradition, it means food considered by a population, or a social group, to
be part of their own specic combinations of foods consumed and ideas and values
on this food handed down from one generation to another (Den Hartog, 1986).
However, it does not mean that the concept of traditional food is unchanged.
1
Rather, tradition is a sequence of variations on received and transmitted themes,
created by incorporating new elements and removing old. Food may come to be
considered traditional regardless of its place of origin (ibid.)
This article deals with the changes in the Japanese cuisine in the rst half of the
twentieth century, based on the adoption of Western, and to a lesser degree Chinese,
culinary elements and concepts. This process illustrates the switch from one version
of culinary tradition to another.
The mid-ninteenth century Japanese society was by no means homogeneous. The
country was divided into more than 260 autonomous feudal regimes, and each had
Address correspondence to: K. Cwiertka, Centre for Japanese and Korean Studies, P.O. Box 9515,
NL-2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands.
1
For the study of changing culinary traditions see Mennell, 1985; Levenstein, 1988; and a detailed
bibliography in Mennell, Murcott & van Otterloo, 1992.
01956663/98/020117+12 $25.00/0/ap970133 1998 Academic Press Limited
118 K. CWIERTKA
a strong sense of regionalism. Moreover, the sharp class distinction policy maintained
by the central government led to the emergence of close communities with varied
lifestyles, world views and customs. In the context of eating habits, a variety of local
cuisines with great regional dierences, and the urban food culture of the three big
cities: Edo, Kyoto and Osaka, were characteristic for nineteenth century Japan. The
dierences between the elaborate cuisine of the elite, a simple daily diet of other city
dwellers, and a hand-to-mouth existence of the majority of the peasants were very
large. In fact, several culinary traditions in Japan up to the turn of the nineteenth
century should be considered, although the Japanese haute cuisine is usually used as
a representative standard for the culinary culture of pre-modern Japan. This cuisine,
greatly inuenced by the Buddhist vegetarianism, was characterized by the use of
fresh vegetables and seafood in season, scarcity of fat and meat, and the emphasis
on the aesthetic values of dishes (see Menu 1).
Tray
(unlacquered Japanese cedar tray)
Dried sea slug, slivered and simmered in broth,
in a lacquered bowl with ne horizontal grooves
Soup, containing eggplant
Rice
Pickles, dried melon cucumber and prickly ash berries, passed by
host
Passed around dish
Carp, simmered in sake and served with mustardvinegar sauce
Grilled sweetsh
Cowpeas
Sillago, grilled
Sweets
Jellied arrowroot dumplings
Cloud-ear mushrooms
Chestnuts
MrNi 1. A pre-modern Japanese haute cuisine menu (Cort, 1990)
From the 1950s a new, relatively uniform diet became prevalent in Japan. This
new type of cuisine was the mixture of various pre-modern culinary traditions, from
the haute cuisine to a simple peasant diet, and adoptions fromabroadnewfoodstus,
new cooking techniques, and new attitudes towards consumption. During the fol-
lowing decades, this new hybrid food culture diused throughout the entire society,
came to be perceived as traditional by the majority of the Japanese, and was
propagated as such abroad. Menus of Japanese restaurants today are full of hybrid
119 CULINARY TRADITION IN JAPAN
dishes that emerged in the early twentieth century, and household literature hands
over the hybrid tradition to the next generations.
2
The emergence of this new tradition in Japanese food culture was an historical
process taking place in the background of Western penetration of Japan in the
second half of the nineteenth century, through the industrialization, urbanization,
and nally militarization of the country. This note is an attempt to investigate the
mechanism of this process. I will comment on three stages of the Japanese culinary
transformation: the adoption of Western haute cuisine by the Japanese elite, the
domestication of Western dishes and foodstus by the urban middle-class, and the
diusion of the hybrid cuisine during the Pacic War.
Foons1irrs, Disnrs :Nn CiisiNrs
In order to examine closely the transformation of the Japanese diet, the adoptions
of foreign elements must be followed in detail. For this purpose I distinguished three
categories within the wide-ranging concept of food: cuisines, dishes and foodstus.
In my view, these categories migrate and diuse dierently and, therefore, should
be treated separately.
I dened a cuisine as a complex system of foodstus, cookery techniques, dishes
and the names of the dishes, tableware and table manners. When imported, a cuisine
functions independently of the local food culture. It contains a strong cultural
message, and symbolizes the culture where it originated. For example, foreign
restaurants not only serve foreign food, but also have an exotic name, interior, and
play the music from the claimed area of origin. Customers of these restaurants enjoy
the food in a certain atmosphere which is created by elements unrelated to matters
of the palate. Another example is the French cuisine adopted by the elite all over
Europe from the eighteenth century onwards. It was worshipped as a symbol of
haute culture and not for its culinary values alone.
It is important to note that foreign cuisines are usually adopted by the elite, but
rarely enter home cookery of the middle- and lower-classes. However, incorporation
of a single foreign dish into the local diet of the population is quite common. Ishige
(1993, 1994) presumes the migration of dishes is almost always based on such a two-
step processrst a foreign cuisine appears either in the form of a restaurant or in
the form of high-society cuisine, and later dishes from this cuisine diuse further.
By dishes I refer to foodstus that are boiled, fried, fermented, mixed or
prepared in other ways. Examples of dishes that diused abroad are spaghetti in the
Netherlands, curry in the U.K., or sushi in California. Contrary to adopted foreign
cuisines which function autonomously next to the local food habits, foreign dishes
are incorporated into local meals, and therefore need to be transformed into a form
2
For example, an elementary cookery book from 1987 entitled Japanese food lessons included, next
to dishes that have been prepared and eaten in Japan for centuries, also recipes for Green peas rice, Rice
with cutlet topping, Pork saute (avoured with soy), Beef and potato stew (avoured with soy), and
Blanched cabbage and dried young sardines (Arai, 1987). All these recipes belong to the WesternJapanese
hybrid tradition within Japanese cookery (comparable to the AngloIndian tradition within British
cookery). The English edition of the book Japanese cooking quick and easy from 1971 included recipes
for Fried pork, Vegetables rolled in beef, Sweet green peas, Fried pork on skewers, and Sukiyakiall
emerged about half a century ago (Shufunotomo, 1971).
120 K. CWIERTKA
familiar to the local population.
3
Dishes contain cultural messages, but not to such
an extent as cuisines. They may retain or lose their ethnic character. The process of
adapting foreign dishes to local taste preferences is based on repetitive trial and
error, and eventually only a few culinary experiments gain wide acceptance.
4
More-
over, other aspects, such as availability of ingredients or their price, play a role in
this process.
As a foodstuff I dene any thing or material used for food, in other words,
anything that is used as an ingredient of a dish. It should be noted that things
regarded as edible by one culture might not be by another. Foodstus have a cultural
connotation, but usually lose it once they migrate, and acquire new cultural meanings
quite quickly. Corn, for example, was a sacred food for American Indians, but for
Europeans became just a vegetable. Potatoes did not even grow in Europe before
the discovery of America, but for the past 100 years have been regarded as a mainstay
of Central and Northern European cooking. As adopted foodstus often need to
be prepared before they are consumed, and foreign cookery techniques according
to which they used to be prepared are unknown,
5
it seems logical to cook them in
the same way as ingredients already known. Salaman (1985) in The history and social
inuence of the potato gave an example of potatoes being prepared in the sixteenth
century in the same way as artichokes, carrots and parsnips. Similarly, beef at the
beginning of its presence in Japan was consumed in the form of a local dish, sukiyaki.
6
Nrv J:i:Nrsr E

ii1r :Nn Wrs1rN H:i1r CiisiNr

After the ourishing contacts with Europeans in the second half of the sixteenth
century, Japans tendency towards a policy of isolation grew stronger with the result
of closing borders to the outside world in 1638. For over 200 years, contacts with
Europeans were limited to trade with Dutchmen on the man-made island of Deshima
in Nagasaki under strict control of the government. Pressure from Western countries
whose ships started to appear on the Eastern shores from the rst decades of the
nineteenth century gradually broke down the policy of isolation. By 1854, the feudal
government was obliged to open ports for foreign ships, and 14 years later the
government collapsed, overthrown by the oligarchy of middle-ranking samurai.
The oligarchy established two important aims that determined future Japanese
domestic and foreign policy. First, Japan had to avoid allowing itself to be confused
with China or Asia in Western eyes and acquire rather an image of an equal partner
for modern European and American national states. Second, the oligarchy needed
to nd something other than military power to guarantee her political legitimacy on
the domestic stage. Westernization was chosen as a device leading to reach both
aims. On the one hand, by proving its eagerness for Westernization Japan was to
gain an equal status with Western countries. On the other hand, by using Western
3
It should be pointed out that modications in taste, preparation, ingredients and even menus of
migrated cuisines also occur. Nevertheless, they claim to be exact copies of the original.
4
For the comparative research on methods of domesticating Western dishes in Japan and Indian
dishes in the U.K. see Cwiertka, 1997.
5
Such a case would have to be classied as a foreign dish, not a foreign foodstu.
6
A one-pot dish made of meat and vegetables avoured with miso (a fermented paste of soybeans
and usually either barley or rice, with salt), or sweet soy sauce. All Japanese culinary terms in this article
are explained after Hosking, 1996.
121 CULINARY TRADITION IN JAPAN
culture, the new Japanese elite established its position as the creator of new fashions
and new political order on the domestic stage.
Kumakura (1990) argues that, generally speaking, new cultural trends diused
dierently in Europe and pre-modern Japan. European aristocracy created new
fashions in order to distinguish themselves from the rest of society and later those
fashions were imitated by the bourgeois, and trickled-down further. In other words,
they diused from the top to the bottom of the social ladder. In early-modern Japan,
new trends moved in the opposite direction. The source of new fashions was rooted
at the bottom of the social ladder, created by outsiders free from the stereotypes of
everyday life in order to escape from the feudal social structure and the control of
the central government. In the late nineteenth century, the new Japanese elite adopted
the European model by imitating and propagating Western culture. The rest of
society began to imitate models created by the elite, unconsciously accepting the
new leadership. The introduction of French cuisine to the Imperial court and its
adoption by the Japanese elite was a deliberate political move rather than a caprice
of the rich.
The Imperial court was served the rst Western-style dinner on 18 August 1871
(Harada, 1993). Soon after, the public sphere of the Japanese elite had been divided
into two separate entities: Western and Japanese (Esenbel, 1994). Western-style
cuisine was served in a Western-style room, and the diners were dressed in a Western
style. The concept of Japaneseness, called Wa, stood in opposition to Yo, the concept
of Westernness, and in the context of food was represented by Japanese-style food
(wafu ryori) and Western-style food (yofu ryoryori). The concept of Chineseness
7
existed for centuries in Japan but after the emergence of the Western-style fashion
came to be regarded as backward.
In the late nineteenth century three types of expensive restaurant could be
distinguished: Japanese, Western and Chinese; however, the Chinese cuisine was
gradually losing popularity (Maenobo , 1988). As far as culinary literature is con-
cerned, publications dealing with Western and Japanese cuisine were then far more
numerous than those on Chinese food (Ajinomoto, 1992). Nevertheless, the formal
classication of the worlds food included Japanese, Chinese and Western categories;
Japanese cuisine with high aesthetic values, nourishing Western cuisine, and Chinese
cuisine described as something in between the two (Noguchi, 1880). This statement
was rst made in 1880 in the columns of the magazine Fuzoku Gaho (Illustrated
manners and customs). Later, this view was disseminated via household literature.
However, while Western cookery was deliberately promoted through the activities
of various individuals and institutions as nourishing and modern, Chinese food
began to attract the attention of cookery writers only from the 1920s onwards.
Chinese dishes, sold at cheap restaurants opened by Chinese immigrants, gained
popularity of the working classes after World War I. Soon, some of these dishes
were included in the menus of Japanese restaurants, and later into home cookery.
Japanese, Western and Chinese restaurants provided the main catering styles in
Japan before World War II.
8
Apart from the fact that Chinese and Western cookery
in Japan was unconsciously modied, and that modern Japanese cuisine adopted
new ingredients, these three styles were not supposed to be mixed. The blending of
7
Naming of the concept of Chineseness changed depending on changes of dynasties ruling in China.
8
Korean restaurants spread after World War II, followed by various American chains in the 1970s.
The fashion for ethnic restaurants started in the 1980s.
122 K. CWIERTKA
the three styles began to take place in cheap eating houses and in home cookery
from the early twentieth century onwards. In other words, diets of the middle- and
working classes were becoming hybrid. The upper circles of society strictly followed
the distinction between Japanese, Chinese and Western style.
CiiiN:x ExirixrN1s or 1nr Un:N Minnir-ci:ss
The increasing inuence of Western haute cuisine on the life of the Japanese elite
had a great impact on the attitude of the whole society towards Western food. This
is evident with beef as the example. Meat consumption was ocially forbidden in
Japan from the seventh century onwards.
9
Although game and poultry were con-
sumed, beef and pork remained taboo. In 1872, Emperor Meiji (18521912) broke
this taboo by publicly consuming beef. This act had great consequences on Japanese
diet, as within 6 years 556 butchers shops were operating in the whole district of
Tokyo (Harada, 1995). That does not mean, however, that the Japanese adopted
Western meat dishes for daily use. It must be kept in mind that the majority of the
Japanese consumed beef in the form of gyunabe (later called sukiyaki), which was
not a Western dish. It was a Japanese dish that was originally prepared with game.
As the only modication that occurred was the use of beef, the phenomenon of
gyunabe can be classied as the adoption of a foreign foodstu.
The developments of the late nineteenth century set the stage for the culinary
transformation which took place in the following century. First, Western dishes
began to be adopted by the Japanese urban middle-classes who, contrary to the
elite, could not aord to imitate a purely Western-style diet at home. The incorporation
of Western dishes into Japanese home cookery actually began in the early twentieth
century, although voices propagating this idea could be heard earlier. Economic and
social transition in Japan formed the background for this development.
Rapid industrialization resulted in something of a population explosion among
the middle-classes. Factory owners needed the services of lawyers, bankers, managers
and clerks, while growing towns needed more shops, more schools and more
clergymen. Demand created supply, and a great many ambitious young men were
ready and waiting for the opportunity to move up in the world. A great number of
second and third sons, who, by Japanese law, could not inherit anything, moved to
cities and formed the new urban middle-class. The majority of these new-type middle-
class men were wage earners employed by private rms, banks and governmental
oces. The traditional Japanese family, in which the eldest son and his wife and
other unmarried sons and daughters lived with their parents, gradually transformed
into a smaller unit. The focus of the urban family came to be on the husbandwife
relationship rather than on a house. For wage earners the economic signicance
of the family as a unit of production disappeared, and the role of the middle-class
woman changed into that of a housewife. This fact had a great impact on the further
development of Japanese domestic cookery.
Following the Western example, courses in home economics were established at
Japanese womens universities. Sasaki (1911), a lecturer at the Womens University
of Japan (Nihon joshi daigaku), emphasized that changes in everyday life and the
way of thinking required changes in the Japanese kitchen as well. She emphasized
9
For more details concerning consumption of meat in Japan, see Cwiertka, 1996.
123 CULINARY TRADITION IN JAPAN
the need for variety in diet, in particular, and this variety was to be achieved by
adoptions from abroad. Food specialists became involved in food experiments in
order to provide houswives with new ideas for tasty, nutritious, interesting and, at
the same time, cheap meals for the urban family.
Cookery columns of the growing number of womens magazines encouraged
middle-class housewives to try Western dishes and include them into their daily
menus. Dishes propagated by womens magazines and other publications were
carefully chosen froma wide range of possibilities. Diculty of preparation, necessary
equipmentfor example an ovenand the high cost of ingredients were the main
obstacles for the popularizing of Western dishes. A solution to these problems was
given in an article Kondate ni tsukite no chui (Advice concerning the menu) which
appeared in the magazine Katei shuho (Home Weekly) in 1904 (Editorial, 1904a).
We should as much as possible enlarge the number of cookery techniques. For example,
we should in right proportion combine Western food with Japanese and Chinese in order
to achieve variety. We should if possible use Japanese ingredients in Western dishes, such
as udon [soft, thick wheat noodles] and somen [thin wheat noodles] instead of macaroni,
and katsuobushi [shavings of dried, smoked, mould-cured bonito] instead of cheese.
Those ingredients that were too expensive or too dicult to get were regularly
omitted or replaced by Japanese ingredients. Too-complicated cookery techniques
were simplied, and Japanese seasonings were added to make the dish more familiar.
Also, names of dishes were changed in order to make them more suited to the
Japanese menu. Example 1 (Editorial, 1908) demonstrates the addition of a Japanese
ingredient to a Western dish.
Example 1. Stew with somen
Make stew from leak and meat. Add boiled somen cut into pieces, and season with pepper.
Experiments with Western food went further. The Japanese were inventing new
dishes with a Western touch; Western versions of Japanese dishes, or Japanese
versions of European dishes. In Example 2 (Nihon, 1909), chocolate sauce is used
in a Japanese dessert, and in Example 3 (Editorial, 1917) a Japanized spread is used
on a Western sandwich.
Example 2. Chimaki (dumplings made of rice-our, boiled or steamed) in chocolate sauce
Make dough of water and rice our. Form long (about 3 cm) and narrow dumplings; boil
or steam them. Pour chocolate sauce over them.
Example 3. (no name given)
Soak dried abalone in water and marinate it for some time. Chop it, and mix with chopped
wakame (seaweed, Undaria pinnitida) and mayonnaise sauce. Serve on bread.
The easiest way to achieve an innovative character in diet was to serve Western
dishes in a Japanese-style meal, as in Example 4 (Editorial, 1907). Bread is treated
here as a side dish accompanying rice and soupbasic elements of the Japanese-
style meal.
10
The opposite situation was also possible (see Example 5), namely serving
10
For the majority of the urban population who could aord consumption of rice on a daily basis,
rice was the core of every meal. However, Japanese peasantsactual producers of riceate it only at
special occasions. The rice consumption in Japan diminished greatly in the 1930s and 1940s owing to a
decreased production and the limited imports. In the 1950s the pre-war consumption level was achieved.
For the importance of rice in Japanese life, see Ohnuki-Tierney, 1993.
124 K. CWIERTKA
Japanese dishes as an element of a Western-style meal, such as broiled sha
compulsory element of a Japanese-style breakfast (Editorial, 1904b).
Example 4. (no name given)
Breakfast: bread/rice with shrimps and yuba (soy-milk skin)/sunomono (vegetables and/or
slices of seafood dressed in vinegar).
Example 5. (no name given)
Breakfast: pear jam with cream/broiled sh/bread/coee.
Experiments with Western food continued, but by the third decade of the twentith
century a certain framework of acceptability was created. The basic rules concerning
the blending of Japanese and Western foodstus, seasonings and cooking techniques
were established. Although, in the meantime, some experiments were rejected and
forgotten, some formed the prototype of modern Japanese cookery, and diused
among urban middle-class households. New dishes were no longer perceived as
exotic, but still regarded as a novelty. However, the historical circumstances of the
1930s and the 1940s accelerated their diusion.
Foon Sno1:cr, W: :Nn Occii:1ioN
Until 1945 the role of the military was crucial in the Westernization of the
Japanese diet. First of all, the Japanese food industry developed, stimulated by the
governmental orders for the army and navy during the SinoJapanese (18941895)
and RussoJapanese (19041905) wars. Industrial foods entered the civilian market
after World War I, and for a long time were associated with the military diet. Next
to the products of Western origin, such as canned green peas, pineapple and sardines,
Japanese inventions were also manufactured. For example, Yamato-ni was the name
of canned beef boiled with soy sauce, sugar and ginger root. Canned beef Yamato-
ni was originally provided for ghting Japanese soldiers, and combined nutritional
beef with the familiar taste of soy sauce (Ishige, pers. comm.). Yamato-ni literally
means: boiled in Yamato style, the ending -ni meaning boiled and Yamato, being
the old name of Japan. This name was often used to represent Japaneseness, such
as in Yamato-e (Japanese style painting) or Yamato-uta (old Japanese poetry).
Consequently the name Yamato-ni was supposed to support the morale of ghting
soldiers, but in the course of time came to mean any meat boiled in sweet soy with
ginger.
By the 1920s, a rm repertoire of Westernized dishes was served on a large scale
in the Japanese Army as well as in the Navy. Examples 6 and 7 come from the
cookery book for navy cooks containing favourite dishes served on Japanese battle-
ships in 1936 (Kaigun Shukeika, 1936). These dishes were nourishing, easy to prepare,
relatively inexpensive, and enthusiastically welcomed by the sailors.
Example 6. Beef stew with miso
Ingredients
Fresh beef, carrots, potatoes, onions, miso, tomato sauce, salt, pepper, beef fat, our, soy
sauce, sake (rice wine with an alcohol content of about 16%).
125 CULINARY TRADITION IN JAPAN
Preparation
Cut beef into pieces of about 10 momme (1 momme=374 g), peel vegetables and cut
them in four. Heat beef fat in a pan and fry meat until the outside becomes golden brown.
Add some our and fry 23 min, then add hot water until it covers meat, some sake,
tomato sauce and miso. Stew until meat becomes slightly hard, then add vegetables, salt,
pepper and soy sauce, and continue simmering.
Example 7. Boiled soboro
11
potatoes
Ingredients
Fresh beef, potatoes, onions, ginger root, soy sauce, katakuriko
12
, sugar.
Preparation
Peel potatoes, cut them in pieces and rinse in water. Mince beef and chop onions. Let
water, soy sauce and sugar boil for a while, later add potatoes and take them out when
done. Mix the result of the sauce with minced meat, chopped onions, ginger root and
katakuriko. Put on re until it gets thick. Serve on potatoes.
By the third decade of the twentieth century, Japanized Western dishes such as
croquettes, cutlets, stews and curries acquired a clear military connotation. They
started to be associated with the healthy and strong appeal of the Japanese military
men rather than with the West. For example, in the chapter entitled: Soldiers and
food from the propaganda booklet for children published in 1943, the following
passage can be found:
Soldiers are gluttons. When they notice a cow passing the battleeld they immediately
feel like eating a beef steak. Or, and this is a slightly dirty story, once they see a urinating
horse they recall how they drank beer in the homeland. (Muneta, 1943)
Amalgamation of Western foods with the image of the Japanese military was so
strong that their consumption was propagated by the authorities despite a general
policy of removing Western elements from all aspects of life in Japan. Militarization
of the society, from the mid-1930s in particular, accelerated Westernization of the
Japanese diet, as military concepts, including the Westernized concept of proper
nutrition, began to encompass the civilian lifestyle. The general public was encouraged
through popular and professional publications to follow military nutritional advice.
Westernized diet, which in the meantime became the hallmark of the military lifestyle,
was enthusiastically propagated by the military regime. Moreover, the School of
Nutrition, opened by the military-based association, Ryoyukai, in 1939, trained
dieticians according to the military models. Pupils of this school continued to
determine the future menus of factory and school canteens and other places of mass
catering far beyond the end of the Pacic War.
The growing food shortage was another factor responsible for the popularization
of Western foods.
13
Ironically, while new, more Japanese-sounding names for baking
11
Crumble topping for which minced chicken or meat; shredded, boiled shrimp and sh are lightly
parched, seasoning being optional.
12
Flour of Japanese dogs tooth violet (Erythronium japonicum). Under the same name, potato starch
is now normally used as a cheap substitute.
13
The shortage of rice caused the most serious change. Production of tubers and grains other than
rice was more ecient than rice cultivation. A switch into a diet based on tubers, wheat and other grains
required dierent side dishes. Vegetables of Western origin, onions, cabbage, beans etc. were easy to farm
in small home gardens which urban housewives were advised to cultivate. Moreover, one-pan dishes,
such as soups and stews, became prevalent owing to the shortage of fuel. Bread and ships biscuits were
particularly ecient, as they could be stored for a long time.
126 K. CWIERTKA
powder and wheat our were being invented in order to meet the requirements of
the nationalistic policy of the government (Zenkoku, 1941), foods of Western origin
were becoming more and more popular. For example, diusion of the custom of
eating bread and potatoes as a staple was very closely related to the shortage of
rice, starting in mid-1930s. While vast amounts of food were sent to the war front,
and the working force concentrated on production for military purposes, food
shortage broke even the most conservative opponents of Westernization of the
Japanese diet, such as the Society for Research on Japanese Cuisine (Nihon ryori
kenkyukai). This organization for professional chefs was founded in 1930 to protect
Japanese cuisine from Western inuences, and its activity focused on organizing
culinary contests and publishing a monthly newsletter Kaiho (Bulletin). Despite this
attitude, the society held a Substitute Food Contest in September 1940, and among
the winning dishes were buttered toast sprinkled with shrimp powder, deep-fried
noodles in curry sauce, and potato pancake sandwiches (Nihon, 1940).
The reality of the food shortage remained the main issue concerning the Japanese
diet between the 1930s and the mid-1950s. Almost 20 years of food shortage had a
very strong impact on the future of Japanese cuisine, namely its democratization
and regional homogenization. Although the new, American inuences reached
Japanese eating habits from the mid-1940s onwards, the rst two post-war decades
should be viewed rather as a diusion of the urban middle-class model of consumption
created in the pre-war period.
CoNciiniNc Rrx:xs
Hobsbawm (1983) sees the contrast between the constant changes and innovations
of the modern world, and the attempt to structure at least some parts of social life
within it as unchanging and invariant, as one of the reasons for inventing traditions.
This mechanism was partly responsible for the creation of Japanese modern tra-
ditions, as Japan underwent a rapid economical, political, cultural and social
transformation within the past century. For example, the Japanese-style traditional
wedding ceremony in a shrine is a modied version of the Christian ceremony and
does not go back further than the beginning of this century (Inoue, 1990). The
concept of the traditional Japanese diet emerged within the past 100 years as well.
On the other hand, diusion of the healthy diet with relatively few regional
dierences suited the political aims of the Japanese national state. It needed a strong
nation with deep nationalistic feelings, and both aims could be achieved by proper
nourishment and the idea of national unity embodied in a uniform diet.
It should be kept in mind, however, that specic historical circumstances de-
termined the culinary transition of modern Japan. One of the most important factors
which should be taken into consideration was Japans confrontation with the West
at the time when Western nations were controlling a considerable part of Asia.
The most signicant aspect of the early Meiji [the name of an historical period in Japan
(18681912)] times was Japans encounter with the Western world and its deliberate
adoption of Western civilization and examples. For a millennium China had been a
neighboring cultural colossus in terms of which Japan had formed and in a sense dened
itself. Japanese culture and taste, blended with those of China, had come to be referred
to as east Asian (Toyo), and that remained permanently a part of Japanese consciousness.
127 CULINARY TRADITION IN JAPAN
But the country of China was no longer an object of esteem; instead it provided an object
lesson of the dangers of stagnation and overcondence. (Collcutt, 1988)
Although a modern version of Japanese culinary tradition emerged on the
basis of the pre-modern legacy and adoptions from Chinese as well as Western
cuisine, at the end of the nineteenth century the impact of Western civilization on
modern Japanese food culture was most signicant. A relative lack of interest towards
Chinese food at that time, despite a long history of culinary relations with China,
proves the change of the Japanese attitude towards Chinese civilization (Ishige, 1994:
199200).
As is evident in the reception of Western food, in order to modernize itself Japan
chose the civilization stronger than that of Chinathe West. Despite a huge cultural
gap between Western and Japanese civilizations, within half a century not only
Western ingredients but also dishes diused into the Japanese kitchen. It is important
to note that this culinary modication was a consequence of a deliberate policy with
the aim of improving dietary variety and nutrient quality.
Western superiority in military terms was to an extent responsible for Japans
emphasis on the military development of the country, and in fact the French and
later the German model was imitated by the Imperial Japanese Army, and the
English standard was followed by the Imperial Japanese Navy. As argued elsewhere,
the involvement of the military in the matters of public nutrition was closely
related to the aim of improving the physical condition of potential conscripts. This
involvement, in turn, was essential for the development and diusion of the hybrid
JapaneseWestern form of diet.
It is dicult to nd a culinary culture without a trace of foreign inuence, and
the tendency to further cross-culturalism seems to overwhelm our diets. Although a
mutual inuence of peoples eating habits is quite evident, there are great dierences
in the way and the extent to which adoption of foreign foods takes place. In a
popular view, the Japanese are the nation of imitators building their future on the
basis of foreign adoptions. It cannot be denied that the development of the culinary
culture of modern Japan has been fuelled by Western foodstus, dishes and cuisines.
However, in the authors judgment, the nature of the Japanese alone cannot be made
responsible for this transformation. The role of historical circumstances was far
more important in the shaping of the culinary culture of modern Japan.
RrrrrNcrs
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Received 6 January 1996, revision 28 February 1997