Masayoshi Yamazaki -- Chuuka Ryouri（中華料理）

 

Back in the 1990s, there was the amazingly over-the-top Fuji-TV hour-long cooking battle show called "Ryouri no Tetsujin"（料理の鉄人...The Iron Chefs） which pitched one of the three house master chefs against a challenger chef from outside Kitchen Stadium. There was Iron Japanese Rokusaburo Michibata（道場六三郎）, Iron French Hiroyuki Sakai（坂井宏行）though he wasn't the first one to have that title, and Iron Chinese Kenichi Chin (or Chen)（陳健一）. Of the three, I always found Chin to be the most openly jovial and down-to-earth, and his father, Kenmin Chin（陳建民）, has been hailed as the chef to first bring Sichuan cuisine to Japan decades ago.

Imagine how shocked and sad I was this morning to find out that Kenichi had passed away on March 11th at the age of 67 from interstitial lung disease. Way too early. Outside of "Ryouri no Tetsujin" Chin often popped up on other cooking shows including ones for NHK so we got to see him via TV Japan all the time showing off his dishes. In the tribute to him this morning, one of his apprentices related an anecdote in which years ago, the apprentice had forgotten to make some gyoza for a customer during the usual whirlwind of activity in the kitchen. Well, he thought that he and the rest of the kitchen would be getting a huge chewing out by their master; Chin himself brought out the belated dish of gyoza to the slightly miffed customer but when he returned to the kitchen, he basically said "Hey, the customer was only a bit ticked. Everything's good!" and then proceeded to throw out one of his usual bad puns. 

In tribute to Chef Chin, I've put up singer-songwriter Masayoshi Yamazaki's（山崎まさよし）"Chuuka Ryouri" (Chinese Food) which was his February 1996 second single under a major label. Written and composed by Yamazaki, it's a folksy pop tune about a man worried about his girlfriend's blue feelings who tries to alleviate things by taking themselves to their favourite Chinese restaurant. There's nothing that can't be cured with a dish of pot stickers and endless cups of tea. The song was also included on Yamazaki's debut album "Arerugii no Tokkouyaku"（アレルギーの特効薬...Wonder Drug for Allergies） which was released a couple of months following the single in April.

I'll leave you with the Iron Chef making up his signature dish, mapo tofu（麻婆豆腐）. I haven't had this dish in ages and someday I would love to have the one that his literal and figurative descendants are probably making now. My condolences to his family, friends and fans of his food.