Tastes of the Past: Food, Sensory Experience, and Memory in Hisashi Kashiwai’s Two Novels
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17507/tpls.1607.05Keywords:
food fiction, sensory studies, memory, identity, Japanese culinary cultureAbstract
The paper explores the intricate interplay between sensory studies and memory in contemporary food literature. The novels analyzed in the paper are Hisashi Kashiwai’s The Kamogawa Food Detectives (2023) and The Restaurant of Lost Recipes (2024). Using the interdisciplinary field of sensory studies and the concept of memory, the paper examines how sensory experiences through food allow for the exploration of themes like memory, forgetting, and remembering in literature. In the selected novels, food becomes a conduit for memories, helping characters recollect nostalgic memories by stimulating their senses. The paper looks at memory as not only a cognitive process but also a multisensory embodied event connected to food and consumption. The novels depict the process of remembering as both sensory and affective. The relationship between food, sensory studies, and memory is triadic, where each element reinforces the other. In addition to bringing back long-forgotten memories, food and its sensory experiences provide individuals with emotional resonance and catharsis. This allows them to heal emotional wounds caused in the past. The paper also studies how food in literature encompasses broader themes, depicting the importance of food in understanding oneself. Furthermore, the paper analyzes how Kashiwai’s depiction of food is deeply rooted in washoku, or Japanese traditional food culture, thereby embedding sensory memory within broader cultural, geographical, and emotional contexts. Through this triadic relationship, the paper discusses how food in Kashiwai’s novels offers a nuanced portrayal of healing, remembrance, and the preservation of cultural identity.
References
Abarca, M. E., & Colby, J. R. (2016). Food memories seasoning the narratives of our lives. Food and Foodways, 24(1–2), 1–8.
Cang, V. (2018). Japan’s Washoku as Intangible Heritage: The role of National food Traditions in UNESCO’s Cultural Heritage Scheme. International Journal of Cultural Property, 25(4), 491–513. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0940739118000267
Chambers, C. (2019). Making Sense of Contemporary British Muslim Novels. Palgrave Macmillan UK. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-52089-0
Connerton, P. (1989). How Societies Remember. Cambridge University Press.
Fizell, M. (2021). Gastronomic body: Sensory and Sociocultural Dimensions of Food Art [PhD dissertation]. University of New South Wales. https://doi.org/10.26190/unsworks/2369
Green, J. D., Reid, C. A., Kneuer, M. A., & Hedgebeth, M. V. (2023). The Proust effect: Scents, food, and nostalgia. Current Opinion in Psychology, 50, 101562. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2023.101562
Howes, D. (2013, August). The Expanding Field of Sensory Studies. Retrieved May 22, 2025, from https://www.sensorystudies.org/sensational-investigations/the-expanding-field-of-sensory-studies/
Howes, D. (2022). The Sensory Studies Manifesto: Tracking the Sensorial Revolution in the Arts and Human Sciences. University of Toronto Press.
Kashiwai, H. (2023). The Kamogawa Food Detectives. Penguin.
Kashiwai, H. (2024). The Restaurant of Lost Recipes. Pan Macmillan.
Katz, S. (2023). A Sensory Study for the Translation of Atmosphere in Silvina Ocampo’s Short Stories [PhD dissertation]. The Open University. https://doi.org/10.21954/ou.ro.00097664
Kern-Stahler, A., & Robertson, E. (2023). Literature and the Senses. Oxford University Press.
Korsmeyer, C., & Sutton, D. (2011). The sensory experience of food. Food Culture & Society, 14(4), 461–475. https://doi.org/10.2752/175174411x13046092851316
Korsmeyer, C. (2014). Making sense of taste: Food and Philosophy. Cornell University Press.
Nuessel, F. (2018). Sensory representation in literature. Semiotica, 2018(222), 101–112. https://doi.org/10.1515/sem-2016-0200
Proust, M. (2006). Remembrance of things past. Wordsworth Editions.
Reid, C. A., Green, J. D., Buchmaier, S., McSween, D. K., Wildschut, T., & Sedikides, C. (2022). Food-evoked nostalgia. Cognition & Emotion, 37(1), 34–48. https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2022.2142525
Reid, C. A., Green, J. D., Wildschut, T., Sedikides, C., McSween, D. K., & Buchmaier, S. (2025). Food nostalgia and food comfort: the role of social connectedness. Cognition and Emotion, 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1080/02699931.2025.2479170
Sutton, D. E. (2001). Remembrance of Repasts: An Anthropology of Food and Memory. Berg Publishers.
Sutton, D. E. (2010). Food and the senses. Annual Review of Anthropology, 39(1), 209–223. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.anthro.012809.104957
UNESCO. (2013, December). Washoku, traditional dietary cultures of the Japanese, notably for the celebration of New Year - UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage. UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage. Retrieved June 4, 2025, from https://ich.unesco.org/en/RL/washoku-traditional-dietary-cultures-of-the-japanese-notably-for-the-celebration-of-new-year-00869
