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飲食、權力與國族認同：當代日本料理的形成
日本料理不僅風行台灣，過去二十年間在西方也日益受到歡迎。但或許讓人意外的是，目前我們所認知的日本料理其實是相當現代的發明。十九世紀末、二十世紀初的日本不僅在政治上發生劇烈改變，同時也是現代飲食文化與習慣形成的關鍵時期。本書從多方面說明，現代日本料理中的多元文化色彩，受到日本帝國主義發展、工業化與民族國家建構的多重影響，作者透過豐富的史料，介紹在十九世紀之前，日本各地飲食文化的多元豐富，並說明這些多元的飲食習慣，是如何轉變為現代我們所認知的「日本料理」。 本書深入日本料理的歷史根源，探索日本家庭料理的變遷、軍隊伙食的西化、戰爭期間的糧食管理，以及現代都市中美食風氣的興起，這些分離的現象，均與日本政經社會的變遷緊密相關。以飲食為窗，本書更進一步討論日本與「西方」在歷史、文化上的互動與互視，分析日本在民族國家發展過程中的歷史情境，如何影響了日常生活的表現與認同。 本書不僅能讓對日本文化、社會感興趣的讀者感到興味盎然，對近年來興起的食物歷史研究、人類學研究，更是重要的東亞研究著作。
265 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 2007
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February 23, 2022
With Modern Japanese Cuisine: Food, Power and National Identity Katarzyna J. Cwiertka has written the best book about Japanese food culture I know. It is much more than the title says: this essay is not only about modern cuisine, that is to say how the Japanese came to eat meat and other outlandish dishes, but much more importantly, it reveals how Japanese food as such was defined. Like many other “typically Japanese” cultural experiences, washoku, the “traditional” Japanese cuisine was only devised in the late 19th - 20th century, after Japan opened its gates to the world.
Take rice, which is still considered as an almost sacred, Ur-Japanese basic food: in pre-modern times rice was only eaten by a few percent of the population, the upperclasses, the rest – including those who cultivated it – could not afford it. Farmers paid their taxes in rice and only in very good years could they eat some of it, mixed with other grains and vegetables – and that was not the present-day white rice. White rice was introduced with a vengeance by the military in the Meiji-period: the boys who joined the ranks, had the privilege to eat nothing but white rice for the first time, and many of them lost their lives before they reached the battlefield, as a diet of only white rice causes beri-beri due to Vitamin B1 deficit, but that was not known yet in the early 20th c.
Western food was introduced at state banquets during the early Meiji years, the period of "Civilization and Enlightenment," which included the lifting of the ban on meat which had been first issued in 675. Although the Japanese did eat seafood and some game, since the 16th c. the eating of meat of domesticated animals as cows was in fact taboo. That was not so much religious (Buddhist) but rather practical: draft animals were needed for food production, there was no space among the rice paddies that constituted the Japanese countryside (and were necessary for tax payments as we have seen) for even small-scale cattle husbandry. Meat was eaten seldom and then only for medicinal reasons.
Many Japanese thought those partaking of meat had a bad smell and that was undoubtedly the case with the British (who in the 19th c. ate nothing but meat, they conveniently believed vegetables were unhealthy) and other Westerners, who only on rare occasions took a bath in contrast to the clean Japanese. So it needed the authority of no one else than the Emperor to break the cultural ban: in 1872 it was officially declared that the Emperor was partaking of meat on a regular basis.
It was still a long way to a sufficient supply of good meat and to multicultural gastronomy but here the Treaty Ports played an important part. The Westerners living in Japan of course kept their own cuisine as much as possible (they considered the “native food” as “inferior”) and taught their Japanese servants how to cook these. These cooks later set up their own restaurants, usually exclusive ones. Hotels catering to foreigners also started restaurants offering yoshoku, Western dishes, first cooked by foreign cooks, later by their Japanese apprentices. All this was rather expensive, but from the mid-twenties on large department stores as Mitsukoshi and Matsuya started setting up affordable Western-style restaurants, finally making multicultural menus available to the urban masses. Yoshoku was predominantly Anglo-Saxon, so we find beef, croquettes, rolled cabbage, omelet and of course curry rice – introduced by British expats who had served in India, but quickly made their own by the Japanese.
The largest role not only in normalizing such multicultural dishes but also in defining the national cuisine was played by the military. After all, all Japanese males, half the population, had to serve as conscripts and eat what they were served. This experience shaped their future food preferences. The military introduced white rice as the centerpiece of the meal, as we saw, and added soy sauce as a crucial flavoring agent. They would also include miso soup. What set the military apart from the rest of the population was the inclusion of “multicultural” side dishes: popular were curries, croquettes and Chinese stir-fries. The reasons were practical: the men came from all over Japan and had different tastes where Japanese food was concerned but all liked the new, multicultural dishes. Moreover, these were easy to handle with a modern, military catering system.
In these years also the home meal was reformed. Women became devoted shufu, housewives of nuclear families, and they governed their katei, their home, as they were supposed to do for most of the 20th century. Not only were cooking schools established where housewives could learn modern home cooking, a host of women’s magazines also helped them on the way with recipes – there were even very popular recipe contests. But also home cooking was multicultural, it was wayo setchu ryori, “Japanese-Western fusion cuisine,” and thanks to the fact that they were eaten in the home many hybrid recipes of the early 20th c. are now nostalgically seen as the ultimate Japanese “mother’s cooking.” Also in the home, meals were structured on the traditional rice-soup-side dishes pattern, only the number of side dishes was enlarged and more variety was sought in their recipes.
The war and its aftermath of course changed everything again, with severe food shortages and rationing. It made not only the hinomaru bento popular, white rice with a red pickled plum in the middle, but also led to the acceptance of other staples than rice, notably bread and noodles. It also erased the difference in cuisine that still existed between city and countryside. Substitute foods were discovered, as the potato sandwich. The militarization of nutrition was continued after the war in civilian canteens (companies, universities) with their curries and other easy dishes and gradually became mainstream civilian culture.
Japanese imperialism during the first half of the 20th c. had another effect on food culture: the embracing of Chinese food as the third pillar of Japanese cuisine, together with Western and Japanese dishes. Ramen noodles already became popular in the thirties, although they differed from Japanese cuisine with their stock of chicken or pork broth instead of soups based on kelp or katsuo (bonito). It was the imperialist expansion into China that helped popularize Chinese food in Japan. And after the war this was reinforced by the fact that many now unemployed soldiers knew how to cook Chinese. They started making gyoza dumplings, a product of wheat flower which in contrast to rice was still available - moreover, dumplings can be filled with about anything, which also came in handy in that period of shortages.
Korean food, by the way, was a different matter. Kimch’i was only accepted in the nineties, during a Korea Boom due to the Seoul Olympics and later a popular television series. But already in the years of food shortage after the war, yakiniku, grilled meat, became popular (first as horumon-yaki, using tripe and offal). Koreans in fact played a large role in the popularization of meat in Japan – another fact is that in the early 20th c. most meat eaten in Japan was imported from Korea, another culinary consequence of imperialism.
Affluence in the second half of the 20th century brought huge dietary changes of its own. Now Japan became the willing victim of American "cultural imperialism," a fascination which led to hamburgers, pizza and French fries, rice cookers and refrigerators, frozen foods and instant foods, McDonalds (so common in Japan that Japanese kids think it is native – it was introduced in 1971 by Fujita Den) and Starbucks. Bread was further popularized at school lunches, and milk and dairy products also became popular. Dining out became pastime number one and family restaurants as Denny's proliferated. Home cooking suffered, but was made infinitely easier by all pre-cooked products now becoming available. In the same period, Japan's cuisine, in the form of sushi and teppanyaki, gradually started going global.
What Cwiertka so aptly shows us, is that Japanese cuisine “is a modern construct conceived in the midst of the 20th century's historical dynamics.” Washoku, while presented as something timeless and unchanging, is a modern invention - although resting upon traditional foundations. One such foundation is of course kaiseki, the meal taken during the tea ceremony that was reconstituted in the 20th c. by chefs as Yuki Teiichi into an extravagant “authentic Japanese” dining experience. The arrangement of foods on dishes in kaiseki even influenced Japanese home cooking in the first half of the 20th c.
What it all serves to demonstrate is that Japanese food culture is not exotic, unique or even traditional – Japanese national cuisine was devised and defined in the 20th century and Modern Japanese Cuisine unveils the story behind that process.
Check out my blog https://adblankestijn.blogspot.com/.
Take rice, which is still considered as an almost sacred, Ur-Japanese basic food: in pre-modern times rice was only eaten by a few percent of the population, the upperclasses, the rest – including those who cultivated it – could not afford it. Farmers paid their taxes in rice and only in very good years could they eat some of it, mixed with other grains and vegetables – and that was not the present-day white rice. White rice was introduced with a vengeance by the military in the Meiji-period: the boys who joined the ranks, had the privilege to eat nothing but white rice for the first time, and many of them lost their lives before they reached the battlefield, as a diet of only white rice causes beri-beri due to Vitamin B1 deficit, but that was not known yet in the early 20th c.
Western food was introduced at state banquets during the early Meiji years, the period of "Civilization and Enlightenment," which included the lifting of the ban on meat which had been first issued in 675. Although the Japanese did eat seafood and some game, since the 16th c. the eating of meat of domesticated animals as cows was in fact taboo. That was not so much religious (Buddhist) but rather practical: draft animals were needed for food production, there was no space among the rice paddies that constituted the Japanese countryside (and were necessary for tax payments as we have seen) for even small-scale cattle husbandry. Meat was eaten seldom and then only for medicinal reasons.
Many Japanese thought those partaking of meat had a bad smell and that was undoubtedly the case with the British (who in the 19th c. ate nothing but meat, they conveniently believed vegetables were unhealthy) and other Westerners, who only on rare occasions took a bath in contrast to the clean Japanese. So it needed the authority of no one else than the Emperor to break the cultural ban: in 1872 it was officially declared that the Emperor was partaking of meat on a regular basis.
It was still a long way to a sufficient supply of good meat and to multicultural gastronomy but here the Treaty Ports played an important part. The Westerners living in Japan of course kept their own cuisine as much as possible (they considered the “native food” as “inferior”) and taught their Japanese servants how to cook these. These cooks later set up their own restaurants, usually exclusive ones. Hotels catering to foreigners also started restaurants offering yoshoku, Western dishes, first cooked by foreign cooks, later by their Japanese apprentices. All this was rather expensive, but from the mid-twenties on large department stores as Mitsukoshi and Matsuya started setting up affordable Western-style restaurants, finally making multicultural menus available to the urban masses. Yoshoku was predominantly Anglo-Saxon, so we find beef, croquettes, rolled cabbage, omelet and of course curry rice – introduced by British expats who had served in India, but quickly made their own by the Japanese.
The largest role not only in normalizing such multicultural dishes but also in defining the national cuisine was played by the military. After all, all Japanese males, half the population, had to serve as conscripts and eat what they were served. This experience shaped their future food preferences. The military introduced white rice as the centerpiece of the meal, as we saw, and added soy sauce as a crucial flavoring agent. They would also include miso soup. What set the military apart from the rest of the population was the inclusion of “multicultural” side dishes: popular were curries, croquettes and Chinese stir-fries. The reasons were practical: the men came from all over Japan and had different tastes where Japanese food was concerned but all liked the new, multicultural dishes. Moreover, these were easy to handle with a modern, military catering system.
In these years also the home meal was reformed. Women became devoted shufu, housewives of nuclear families, and they governed their katei, their home, as they were supposed to do for most of the 20th century. Not only were cooking schools established where housewives could learn modern home cooking, a host of women’s magazines also helped them on the way with recipes – there were even very popular recipe contests. But also home cooking was multicultural, it was wayo setchu ryori, “Japanese-Western fusion cuisine,” and thanks to the fact that they were eaten in the home many hybrid recipes of the early 20th c. are now nostalgically seen as the ultimate Japanese “mother’s cooking.” Also in the home, meals were structured on the traditional rice-soup-side dishes pattern, only the number of side dishes was enlarged and more variety was sought in their recipes.
The war and its aftermath of course changed everything again, with severe food shortages and rationing. It made not only the hinomaru bento popular, white rice with a red pickled plum in the middle, but also led to the acceptance of other staples than rice, notably bread and noodles. It also erased the difference in cuisine that still existed between city and countryside. Substitute foods were discovered, as the potato sandwich. The militarization of nutrition was continued after the war in civilian canteens (companies, universities) with their curries and other easy dishes and gradually became mainstream civilian culture.
Japanese imperialism during the first half of the 20th c. had another effect on food culture: the embracing of Chinese food as the third pillar of Japanese cuisine, together with Western and Japanese dishes. Ramen noodles already became popular in the thirties, although they differed from Japanese cuisine with their stock of chicken or pork broth instead of soups based on kelp or katsuo (bonito). It was the imperialist expansion into China that helped popularize Chinese food in Japan. And after the war this was reinforced by the fact that many now unemployed soldiers knew how to cook Chinese. They started making gyoza dumplings, a product of wheat flower which in contrast to rice was still available - moreover, dumplings can be filled with about anything, which also came in handy in that period of shortages.
Korean food, by the way, was a different matter. Kimch’i was only accepted in the nineties, during a Korea Boom due to the Seoul Olympics and later a popular television series. But already in the years of food shortage after the war, yakiniku, grilled meat, became popular (first as horumon-yaki, using tripe and offal). Koreans in fact played a large role in the popularization of meat in Japan – another fact is that in the early 20th c. most meat eaten in Japan was imported from Korea, another culinary consequence of imperialism.
Affluence in the second half of the 20th century brought huge dietary changes of its own. Now Japan became the willing victim of American "cultural imperialism," a fascination which led to hamburgers, pizza and French fries, rice cookers and refrigerators, frozen foods and instant foods, McDonalds (so common in Japan that Japanese kids think it is native – it was introduced in 1971 by Fujita Den) and Starbucks. Bread was further popularized at school lunches, and milk and dairy products also became popular. Dining out became pastime number one and family restaurants as Denny's proliferated. Home cooking suffered, but was made infinitely easier by all pre-cooked products now becoming available. In the same period, Japan's cuisine, in the form of sushi and teppanyaki, gradually started going global.
What Cwiertka so aptly shows us, is that Japanese cuisine “is a modern construct conceived in the midst of the 20th century's historical dynamics.” Washoku, while presented as something timeless and unchanging, is a modern invention - although resting upon traditional foundations. One such foundation is of course kaiseki, the meal taken during the tea ceremony that was reconstituted in the 20th c. by chefs as Yuki Teiichi into an extravagant “authentic Japanese” dining experience. The arrangement of foods on dishes in kaiseki even influenced Japanese home cooking in the first half of the 20th c.
What it all serves to demonstrate is that Japanese food culture is not exotic, unique or even traditional – Japanese national cuisine was devised and defined in the 20th century and Modern Japanese Cuisine unveils the story behind that process.
Check out my blog https://adblankestijn.blogspot.com/.
July 27, 2021
Japanese cuisine as it is projected and valued today is a modern construct conceived in the midst of the twentieth-century historical dynamics. (p. 175)
Esoteric and academic, this monograph is not a casual read or end-table book. It's what good scholarly writing should be: a well-organized and supported, synthetic analysis of its topic presented in the voice of social history rich with cultural anthropology. In this case, the topic is how Japanese culture as it is understood is a creation of the last 150 years, and Japanese cuisine has been both developed alongside that and directly linked to the cultural construction. From playing catch-up with the industrial West in the wake of the Meiji Restoration to military mobilization to reconstruction after the devastation of WWII, it's deeply interesting to see how a single Japanese identity was inculcated by a series of administrations into regionally-distinct (even Balkanized) populations. This book is a fine learning experience and a great resource for primary sources.
Esoteric and academic, this monograph is not a casual read or end-table book. It's what good scholarly writing should be: a well-organized and supported, synthetic analysis of its topic presented in the voice of social history rich with cultural anthropology. In this case, the topic is how Japanese culture as it is understood is a creation of the last 150 years, and Japanese cuisine has been both developed alongside that and directly linked to the cultural construction. From playing catch-up with the industrial West in the wake of the Meiji Restoration to military mobilization to reconstruction after the devastation of WWII, it's deeply interesting to see how a single Japanese identity was inculcated by a series of administrations into regionally-distinct (even Balkanized) populations. This book is a fine learning experience and a great resource for primary sources.
March 24, 2021
Traz informações sobre a culinária japonesa, sua história e desenvolvimento. A edição brasileira (Senac) traz a história desta culinária no Brasil. Excelente para conhecer um pouco desta culinária maravilhosa.
August 19, 2021
A book that feeds you knowledge but also makes you hungrier. Need to grab a teriyaki afterwards.
December 12, 2020
It’s all in the title. This book chronologically covers the development of a ‘Japanese national cuisine’ from the 1880s to 1980s (with a short postscript bringing us to the present).
It begins with the introduction of Westerners and Western foodstuffs in the Meiji period, covers largely top-down efforts to transform and modernize “what” and “how” regular Japanese eat, and spread of a more scientific approach to nutrition. Several chapters highlight the great influence of military catering and Japanese colonialism (and later postwar deprivation) on bringing new ingredients into the regular Japanese diet. Similar to works by Eric Rath, effort is made to de-romanticize and challenge what we think of ‘traditional’ in Japanese cuisine.
This is essentially a social history on the subject of the origins and changing concepts of Japanese cuisine through the modern period. Don’t expect anything like descriptions of how particular foods are produced.
Some of the content may feel a bit familiar for anyone who’s read other books on Japanese food. But it’s clear and well written, and a good refresher on the subject. It may be a little too expensive for a book of 199 pages plus notes. Still I’m looking forward to the upcoming paperback release of the author’s new and related book.
It begins with the introduction of Westerners and Western foodstuffs in the Meiji period, covers largely top-down efforts to transform and modernize “what” and “how” regular Japanese eat, and spread of a more scientific approach to nutrition. Several chapters highlight the great influence of military catering and Japanese colonialism (and later postwar deprivation) on bringing new ingredients into the regular Japanese diet. Similar to works by Eric Rath, effort is made to de-romanticize and challenge what we think of ‘traditional’ in Japanese cuisine.
This is essentially a social history on the subject of the origins and changing concepts of Japanese cuisine through the modern period. Don’t expect anything like descriptions of how particular foods are produced.
Some of the content may feel a bit familiar for anyone who’s read other books on Japanese food. But it’s clear and well written, and a good refresher on the subject. It may be a little too expensive for a book of 199 pages plus notes. Still I’m looking forward to the upcoming paperback release of the author’s new and related book.
July 11, 2023
作者在書中追溯現代日本料理的形成，並提出一個觀點，認為民族料理非自然形成，而是經由不同參與者的互動及角力建構而成。
日本料理自明治維新與帝國主義起，就穩定地維持「和食—洋食—中華料理」結構，當中的原因或可歸咎於政府嚴格的控制。政府先在明治維新時帶頭享用西洋料理和牛肉，令洋食很快就在日本立足。日本家政教育中對女性「賢妻良母」的要求亦有助日本家庭延續和食的習慣，不同食譜更經由當時流行的雜誌傳遍各地。
其後的二戰則似乎對日本料理的定義有舉足輕重的影響。首先是軍方為避免地方口味的差異而引入洋食到軍人的餐單中，令更多日本人習慣進食原本只流行於城市和中上階層的西洋食物，甚至隨退伍返鄉的軍人普及至家庭料理中。戰爭時的資源貧乏則令政府著手研究營養學，務求以最少成本養活國民；附帶的配給制度更令全國飲食習慣統一，稻米成為日本人的主要糧食。戰後由國家統一提供的學校午餐亦奠定往後歲月的飲食習慣，尤其是麵包和牛奶的普及。
作者指出現代日本飲食始於明治維新時的多元文化主義，然而經歷多年變遷後竟意外地步向同質化。此現象與台灣菜在同一時期的百花齊放形成對比。雖然國內商家和國際環境都左右了日本飲食發展，但從書中所見，政府是當中的最大參與者，書名提到的「權力」也可被理解為國家獨有的公權力。
對於現代日本飲食的同質性，作者似乎忽略了日本民族單一性的影響。不同民族的飲食習慣各異，多民族國家自然較難整合���一套民族料理。以台灣為例，本島漢人和原住民的習俗本身已大大不同，加上1949年來自大江南北的移民，要以一套民族料理系統代表文化背景各異的眾多族群自是比單一民族的日本困難。然而台灣也並非沒有趨向同質化，以本省木薯製造的珍珠奶茶和源自四川的紅燒牛肉麵都成為近年「台灣菜」的標誌，可見本省人與外省人的飲食習慣已經頗為相似。
在建構民族料理時，同質化看來無可避免；而這種同質性正是維繫民族和顯示民族性的重要一環，連結族內每一個人。不同民族料理的形成因權力的介入及民族構成而不一，但相信最終都會邁向同質化這共同終點。
日本料理自明治維新與帝國主義起，就穩定地維持「和食—洋食—中華料理」結構，當中的原因或可歸咎於政府嚴格的控制。政府先在明治維新時帶頭享用西洋料理和牛肉，令洋食很快就在日本立足。日本家政教育中對女性「賢妻良母」的要求亦有助日本家庭延續和食的習慣，不同食譜更經由當時流行的雜誌傳遍各地。
其後的二戰則似乎對日本料理的定義有舉足輕重的影響。首先是軍方為避免地方口味的差異而引入洋食到軍人的餐單中，令更多日本人習慣進食原本只流行於城市和中上階層的西洋食物，甚至隨退伍返鄉的軍人普及至家庭料理中。戰爭時的資源貧乏則令政府著手研究營養學，務求以最少成本養活國民；附帶的配給制度更令全國飲食習慣統一，稻米成為日本人的主要糧食。戰後由國家統一提供的學校午餐亦奠定往後歲月的飲食習慣，尤其是麵包和牛奶的普及。
作者指出現代日本飲食始於明治維新時的多元文化主義，然而經歷多年變遷後竟意外地步向同質化。此現象與台灣菜在同一時期的百花齊放形成對比。雖然國內商家和國際環境都左右了日本飲食發展，但從書中所見，政府是當中的最大參與者，書名提到的「權力」也可被理解為國家獨有的公權力。
對於現代日本飲食的同質性，作者似乎忽略了日本民族單一性的影響。不同民族的飲食習慣各異，多民族國家自然較難整合���一套民族料理。以台灣為例，本島漢人和原住民的習俗本身已大大不同，加上1949年來自大江南北的移民，要以一套民族料理系統代表文化背景各異的眾多族群自是比單一民族的日本困難。然而台灣也並非沒有趨向同質化，以本省木薯製造的珍珠奶茶和源自四川的紅燒牛肉麵都成為近年「台灣菜」的標誌，可見本省人與外省人的飲食習慣已經頗為相似。
在建構民族料理時，同質化看來無可避免；而這種同質性正是維繫民族和顯示民族性的重要一環，連結族內每一個人。不同民族料理的形成因權力的介入及民族構成而不一，但相信最終都會邁向同質化這共同終點。
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