Set up by a non-governmental group of experts — though with the “blessing” of the agriculture ministry — an organization dedicated to certifying the authenticity of Japanese restaurants around the world kicked its operations off yesterday.
“We are not aiming at something like a sushi police aiming to crack down on inauthentic restaurants,” said a member of the Organisation to Promote Japanese Restaurants Abroad, declining to be named.
“Our objective is to promote Japanese food, not eliminate Japanese restaurants.”
This is my favorite part of the story, which comes to us from Yahoo!
Japanese officials and tourists have voiced growing alarm at what they see as vile imitations of their cuisine overseas, fearing that Japanese food will go the way of Chinese cuisine in North America and Europe.
I guess they have a point here — I remember getting takeout from a Chinese joint in the Bronx near to where I used to work that was the grimmest box-behind-a-bullet-proof-window-serving-food I’ve ever seen.
By the same token I’ve been to enough low-quality sushi restaurants in the states that are probably equally offensive as the Chinese closet in the Bronx.
I vote yes for the Japanese Sushi Police. But price ought to be part of the control.
The ubiquitous California roll is a case in point. The vegetarian sushi dish, which replaces sushi with avocado or cucumbers and may include cream cheese, is unrecognisable to most Japanese.
For the record this is a very popular roll in Korea.
The body has already opened bureaus in Bangkok, Shanghai and Taipei and plans to expand to Amsterdam, London, L.A. and Paris in the near future.
7 responses so far ↓
1 Simon Currie // Jan 30, 2008 at 7:32 pm
The thing is, Japan is the home of often good but inauthentic ethnic dishes. Chinese dishes are often missing some key spices that are too spicy for the Japanese palate. Mayo-tuna-corn-potato pizza anyone? (Though, in all fairness, this is often a variation on American style delivery pizza, which in itself can be good but is not authentic to its Italian roots.) Spaghetti can feature tarako (fish roe). Japanese curry is a soul food that is unrecognizable to Indians and Thais. And Japanese kimchi often lacks a kick or five.
Ethnic food doesn’t have to be authentic to be good, as there are some great fusion/localized dishes out there, including here in Japan.
Typical government hypocricy. They should’ve promoted this as recognizing authentic Japanese restaurants around the world, but instead the typically bumbling Japanese PR machine (or the lack there of) made it sound like there was going to be a new sushi police in town. Japan’s pretty hopeless when it comes to promoting itself and its image overseas.
2 Shinsano // Jan 30, 2008 at 10:34 pm
Korea too. In fact Korean Chinese food is less like Chinese food than American Chinese food, if you can follow that. And I love Korean food. The Chinese Korean being the exception.
Korean spaghetti and pizza…no, unless, sadly, it’s chain pizza. They’re the only ones I can order straight cheese or peperoni from without being told I’m breaking the rules.
I need to do a post about the newest pizza creations here.
3 ken // Jan 31, 2008 at 2:45 am
I sense that race is the issue here. It’s striking how many Japanese restaurants in the U.S. are run by Korean or Chinese Americans, but most patrons either can’t tell the difference or don’t care. This group probably resents the passing off of Japanese cuisine by non-Japanese. I wonder how many Japanese restaurants run by Korean or Chinese Americans will get the “real” stamp of approval.
4 Shinsano // Jan 31, 2008 at 9:42 am
That’s a good point Ken. I doubt that’s the sole reason, but I’m sure race will figure into it. Unfortunately race and nationalism nearly always figures into these sorts of situations where China, Japan and Korea are concerned.
I used to have a poster of a cat dressed up as a Sushi chef, standing before a big plate of sushi. I wish I still had that. Along the lines of Dogs Playing Poker.
5 Simon Currie // Jan 31, 2008 at 5:49 pm
Yeah, great point ken, but as Shinsano pointed out, that’s probably not the only issue (though it may be a major issue to those running show, who knows?)
And yes, China, Korea, and Japan love playing up the nationalism trump card whenever possible. Pretty childish. Kind of resembles pre-EU England, France, Germany triangle?
6 Japanese Pizza « Japanese Ice Hockey, etc. // Jan 31, 2008 at 11:15 pm
[...] by simoncurrie on 2008 January 31æ—¥ Thursday Since my comment on the Japanese Sushi Police entry at East Windup Chronicle triggered this post about Korean Pizza, I thought I’d write [...]
7 Yasuyuki Maeda // May 2, 2008 at 5:58 am
Hello nice to meet you.
KO-N-NI-CHI-WA (^_^)v
I am Japanese.
I saw your wonderful site.
Please link to this site !
ã€Website】http://food-of-japan.blogspot.com/
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