Japanese American Cookbook
Japanese Cooking and Etiquette
Notes: An English-language Japanese etiquette and cookbook written by Nisei students just before the outbreak of the Second World War.
This book collects perhaps 150 recipes for soups, stews, main dishes, sashimi (raw fish), and nori maki (sushi rolls). The recipes use English measurements (tablespoons, cups, etc.) with detailed, straightforward instructions, some of which run for pages. The Japanese etiquette section covers visiting friends, public bath houses, wrapping gifts, holidays and festivals, and weddings and funerals. There is an extensive index, including for the recipes by main ingredient.
This was the second (of two) book projects published by the graduating class of the Keisen Jo Gakuen, a finishing school for Kibei, American-born students of Japanese descent (Nisei) who studied in Japan for a few years. The school offered a two-year course of study for Nisei women who had completed high school. It was an elite institution, with just ten graduating students in 1940, run by Michi Kawai, a founder of the Japanese branch of the YWCA.
This book is one of just a few Japanese cookbooks written for an American audience prior to World War Two. OCLC records two copies of this title in US libraries, both at theological seminaries, probably connected to Michi Kawai's Christian work. Its scarcity may be explained by its publication date, so close to the start of the US-Japanese war. While the title page is dated 1940 and the colophon has a 1940 date stamp, the Japanese printer's colophon is dated April 1941 (Showa 15), eight months before Japan and America went to war.
xii, 219 pages, plus five leaves of plates. For more on the Keisen school, see Eiichiro Azuma, Between Two Empires, pp. 142–145.
Edition + Condition: First edition. Minor loss to the unprinted spine; corners worn; generally very good in blue-green printed wrappers.
Publication: Tokyo: Keisen Girls' School, 1940 (but actually Showa 16 or 1941).
Item No: #308118
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