Comment by tkgally | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tkgally | Hacker News Reader

Long-time resident of Japan here. This article was a revelation; I had no idea that the humble katsu curry is now so common in the U.K.

A similar phenomenon of culinary appropriation and adaptation might be the Nepali-run Indian restaurants in Japan. In the past twenty years or so, they have spread to nearly every corner of the country. Though independently owned and run, they have largely similar menus, with food that, I've read, would seem out of place in both Nepal and India.

A recent book in Japanese [1] does a good job of tracing their origins and their role in giving immigration and employment opportunities to Nepalis.

[1] https://shinsho.shueisha.co.jp/kikan/1208-n/

Addendum: After I posted the above, I counted in my head the number of Nepali/Indian restaurants within a twenty-minute walk of my home in Yokohama and came up with six (I’ve eaten at all of them). It turns out that there are several more. Here’s a map of my neighborhood with them marked:

https://www.gally.net/temp/20240823_Indian_Nepali_restaurant...

If anyone wants to see what they look like on Google Street View or search for others, here’s a link:

https://www.google.com/maps/search/%E3%82%A4%E3%83%B3%E3%83%...

Probably none of them have katsu curry on the menu, though I have been to a few Nepali/Indian restaurants in Japan that did serve it—no doubt to appeal to less-adventurous Japanese tastes.

Pretty much all non-Japanese food in Japan is some form of “cultural appropriation” to the extent that it plays into stereotypes/tropes Japanese people expect from that given “cuisine”. For example, Italian would consist of lots of cheese. Japanese “Italian” food is in a category of its own. In this case, it would be actual appropriation because it’s made by Japanese people rather than the given ethnic minority putting a spin on their cuisine. Best comment I’ve ever read on Reddit is that the Japanese don’t like cheese, they like the concept of cheese. Japanese people can’t stand strong smells nor spice, so that already greatly restricts the authenticity of food.

The exception would be if the restaurant is catering specifically or exclusively to the immigrant population. I’ve found this to be common in Vietnamese restaurants where it’s just a community hangout spot for the migrant workers.

Since you live in Yokohama, the entire town plays on stereotypes and tropes of what Japanese think of Chinese. Namely, all the fortune teller shops since the Japanese think Chinese people are mystical (the Western version is fortune telling machines feature an automata wearing a Turban or Gypsies).

Thanks for the response. I mostly agree with you about the food, but not about Yokohama. Chinatown is a tiny, atypical part of Yokohama; the vast majority of the city, including where I live, has nothing to do with stereotypes of Chinese. Also, Japanese views of China and of Chinese people are, for better or worse, diverse and complex, and mysticalness and fortune-telling play little to no role for most people.

I was in Japan the past two weeks and coming from NYC I wanted to try some pizza. So while in Sapporo I tried pizza at the Kirin beer garden (maybe Sapporo? I was drunk) and was disappointed. The cheese was a small pat in each quadrant and bland, similar to polly-o, the sauce lacked flavor which tasted like jar sauce, and the crust was under cooked. Then in Tokyo wandering the Ueno shopping district I found a small Italian joint that also had pizza. Same issues as my experience in Sapporo but the dough was almost uncooked in the center.

I will say they got the look of pizza down but none of the flavor and texture is all wrong. Feels more like a quick and dirty homemade pizza using cheap canned super market ingredients. Maybe they need a fat guy named Sal from Queens to lend a hand. Maybe they just dont like the flavor or texture of proper pizza.

Congrats, you learned what it’s like to live in Japan and be eternally disappointed with pizza. Swap burritos and the same experience mostly fits.

Was one of the more annoying parts of living there. You’d often have a place open, they’d get it “right”, then it either closes or they slowly change the food to fit the Japanese palette over time and the dish becomes a weird mirage.

There are a few exceptions - but that’s few and far between.

I suppose the stronger garlic and onion flavors along with oregano isn't appealing to the Japanese pallet.

I had lasagna in Sri Lanka once and had an similar experience. Looked like it, tasted nothing like it.

It's like the only thing they had to go on was a picture of what lasagna looks like.

> Pretty much all non-Japanese food in Japan is some form of “cultural appropriation”

Pretty much all food everywhere is cultural appropriated to some degree--authenticity when it comes to cuisine is essentially a meaningless term.

It’s pretty “popular” in United States also, well at least in my group of peers whenever we’re going for sushi one of us will have ordered katsu curry.

My absolute favorite is the curry as it’s made by Yayume sushi in San Ramon.

That's interesting. In Japan, you might have a hard time finding a place that serves both sushi and katsu curry. Restaurants tend to specialize.

I suspect it's because in the US, it all gets lumped together under the "Japanese food" category. I suspect the dishes being foreign in origin makes people less likely to consider them as separate categories.

I can confirm that I have the same thing in my part of the US though. A lot of restaurants will offer sushi and ramen both on the menu, with some other dishes like katsu curry showing up here and there. I would say the best sushi/ramen places here do specialize (just like you said about Japan), but it's pretty common to see places which don't.

They specialize here too, but midrange sushi spots always have a section of the menu catering to the one family member who hates sushi.

Is this unique to certain genres? Everyone in the UK knows about "Chinese takeaway chips" and "Indian Omlettes", but you don't see such concessions in Thai, Italian, French etc. places.

I can only speak to Japanese places in the US.

Quite a few people in the US have an aversion to eating raw meat, including sushi. Any mid range restaurant is going to offer more than just sushi so that there's something for everyone when a group wants to go out to eat.

Always love to shock US-Americans with the fact that we eat raw pork in Germany (google mettigel)

Heh, it probably would have been more shocking a generation or two ago. My mom liked to joke that her mom would overcook pork chops so badly that they would shatter if you dropped them. She was terrified of trichinosis, probably at least partially justifiably so.

In fact, I'd never even heard of eating pork as anything other than well-done until I saw Gordon Ramsay cook a pork chop medium rare.

Here in Sweden, I've seen some restaurants (I can't speak to the frequency of it) having cooked fish in some of the choices.

Sure, in america you might have a hard time finding a restaurant that serves both cheese burgers and american style spaghetti w/ meatballs. But when abroad you might find an 'american restaurant' that has both on their menu.

I think it's just down to people starting a 'foreign restaurant', there may just not be enough market for a specialty foreign food so you pack in a few popular dishes together and run a 'foreign country restaurant' instead of just a specialty place.

Certainly even in my corner of america (the pnw) where sushi is quite popular, we have a mix of places that just do sushi, or most do sushi and a few other dishes, or just a 'japanese restaurant'.

The cheesecake factory, amongst other chains.

Sure, and in japan you might find the japanese equivalent. The basic argument was though that you find these ultra specialized places mostly within the country of the foods origin and that they are more common than more broad places. Which I think is a worldwide trueism.

Almost without exception, restaurants in the US that specializes in fish will have non-fish options, because there's a sizeable minority that will not eat fish at all (or at least anything still recognizable as fish).

It’s very common in Portland, OR — I had pork katsu this week at a Hawaiian place. Curry less so, but plenty of non-sushi Japanese restaurants around.

It is mostly a kid's food in Japan. When we lived there our kids loved Japanese curry. Now that we are back in the US, we can get it from Amazon. The kids are a lot older, but they still love it.

https://www.amazon.com/Golden-Curry-Sauce-Mild-Ounce/dp/B07B...

Would you recommend any of these as "must try"? (I'm going to be in Yokohama in October for the YIS centennial anniversary.)

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