Download - Brainshare Public Online Library

Celebrations of Emperor’s Birthday at the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, from Shokudōraku,
Aki no maki (1903).
Despite Chamberlain’s censure, the Japanese public welcomed these new
eating places with joy and excitement. Takahashi Kichitarō recalls his
father, who was an apothecary in Chinese medicine, taking him, a young
boy at the time, to such a restaurant for dinner in 1910. He was then treated
to a three-course meal that started with soup, followed by beef cutlet
and an omelette, and he never forgot the experience. 36
The reliance on Anglo-Saxon dishes rather than French cuisine was
determined by two factors. First of all, it represented the British and
American supremacy in the life of Western communities in the treaty ports.
Since these new restaurants were being set up and run by former employees
of Western households or restaurants that were patronized by the overwhelmingly
British and American Western community, they featured food
that had been prevalent there. A typical (breakfast) bill of fare served in a
Yokohama hotel in the early 1890s included the following items:
Porridge
Fried fish
Boiled eggs
Bacon and eggs
Ham and eggs
47