Oishinbo - Vol. 30 Ch. 274 - A Self-Made Man (Part 2)

[MangaDex]

 

[Babymech2]

Thank God the software billionaire got some proper help; just think how embarrassed he would have been otherwise at his next trip to Epstein Island

 

[Mugiwara325]

I'm back, and I bring with me the conclusion to this Dan-centric story.

I think it's pretty neat how this sets up the chemistry between Dan and Yamaoka. Dan seemingly has enough grace to recognize Yamaoka's brilliance in food, and isn't so petty that he'd refuse his help because of the love rivalry.
Yamaoka also ends up learning to be more considerate to Dan, despite his natural disinterest in the rich and powerful. This is a dynamic that I like much more than the sabotagey backstabbing we tend to associate with love triangles like this, and I think it makes the Dan rivalry more compelling than it normally would.

I do also think, Yamaoka's initial disinterest is meant to be a hint at his true feelings for Kurita, but I wonder how much we're meant to read into that. I've kinda just glossed over it for now.

 

[LavTheBurger]

It IS jarring to read these chapters in 2026, because billionaires have never had a worse reputation or optics. (Justifably so).

Like this story wouldnt be written today because it would genuinely stop at the bit where Yamaoka goes " The fuck should I care " and most audiences would go " ...Yeah. "

Nowadays, people have no sympathy for "selfmade" (No such fucking thing either as a billionaire, Dan my dude.) or old money billionaires.

I think thats probably the biggest disconnect reading this old manga now and as a Northern European, because talking up rich folks or even given them attention in the form of a big fancy dinner like Dan here, is kind of the reverse of Jante Law. (A unwritten list of social laws/rules that sort of permeate Scandi/Swedish society. I'd link a image of em but I dont know how fileadding works here, lol. Either way, its google'able, and they'll pop up, making more sense of my point, I hope.)

 

[Mugiwara325]

It IS jarring to read these chapters in 2026, because billionaires have never had a worse reputation or optics. (Justifably so).

Like this story wouldnt be written today because it would genuinely stop at the bit where Yamaoka goes " The fuck should I care " and most audiences would go " ...Yeah. "

Nowadays, people have no sympathy for "selfmade" (No such fucking thing either as a billionaire, Dan my dude.) or old money billionaires.

I think thats probably the biggest disconnect reading this old manga now and as a Northern European, because talking up rich folks or even given them attention in the form of a big fancy dinner like Dan here, is kind of the reverse of Jante Law. (A unwritten list of social laws/rules that sort of permeate Scandi/Swedish society. I'd link a image of em but I dont know how fileadding works here, lol. Either way, its google'able, and they'll pop up, making more sense of my point, I hope.)

The Jante Law is super interesting. It reads almost like a championing of humility and tactfulness, which I think are good values to have.

From an East Asian/Southeast Asian perspective, Dan's dinner is pretty much expected conduct for someone super rich. There's this sense of wealth worship that permeates our societies, so people are not only driven to work for materialistic wealth, but also champion people who have achieved it. Anything they do, their expressions of lavishness and decadence, are seen as end goals for a lot of people. Adding to this is the idea that success is built on connections and personal relations, not just hard work. So knowing a rich guy personally is also celebrated a lot.

I'm not a fan of that lifestyle, but I can recognise that I'm in the minority here. I dislike conflict even more so I just go along with it and maybe roast my friends about it when the mood feels right. They already know how I feel about it.

 

[d_a_renoir]

Yeah, another chapter where I want to give Kurita a big smack. Like, I try not to be too nasty, but I'm losing it. She's being an obnoxious twat and a useless b*tch for throwing a tantrum at Yamaoka to help Dan when he really has no stake in it. Like why can't SHE do anything herself, huh? Has she learned nothing at all in all her time doing Ultimate Menu work AND the food World Tour?

Her whinging about his character is also bullshit, like Yamaoka literally has always been like this. He helps people only when he feels like it, and when not he has to be threatened into it by Oohara or Koizumi or Tomii.

 

[LavTheBurger]

The Jante Law is super interesting. It reads almost like a championing of humility and tactfulness, which I think are good values to have.

From an East Asian/Southeast Asian perspective, Dan's dinner is pretty much expected conduct for someone super rich. There's this sense of wealth worship that permeates our societies, so people are not only driven to work for materialistic wealth, but also champion people who have achieved it. Anything they do, their expressions of lavishness and decadence, are seen as end goals for a lot of people. Adding to this is the idea that success is built on connections and personal relations, not just hard work. So knowing a rich guy personally is also celebrated a lot.

I'm not a fan of that lifestyle, but I can recognise that I'm in the minority here. I dislike conflict even more so I just go along with it and maybe roast my friends about it when the mood feels right. They already know how I feel about it.

I feel Jante Law runs entirely opposite to say, American Exceptionalism. Also, the thing about the Jante Law IS that like..its ok if you are rich. But if you at all think its means youre above your next fella, or money and status (Professional status is ofcourse respected and listend to) means you know/matter more, thats where most Scandis will probably despise you behind your back..or openly. President Trump for example is largely detested here because he truly runs anathema to each of the points of the Jante Law list.

Also in Dan's case, the way he handled that dinner would probably to mot Swedes come off as insincere/selfpraising? Like he makes a bif speech of how " Well, I'm rich...but I'm imperfect. ". Thats not humility. Not really.

The Scandi culture waywould more be realizing that bit and....not bringing attention to it? Not in a " look at me " way but more " I'mma do better and if someone notices, thata nice. If they don, atleast I bettered myself. "

Does that make sense?

Yeah, another chapter where I want to give Kurita a big smack. Like, I try not to be too nasty, but I'm losing it. She's being an obnoxious twat and a useless b*tch for throwing a tantrum at Yamaoka to help Dan when he really has no stake in it. Like why can't SHE do anything herself, huh? Has she learned nothing at all in all her time doing Ultimate Menu work AND the food World Tour?

Her whinging about his character is also bullshit, like Yamaoka literally has always been like this. He helps people only when he feels like it, and when not he has to be threatened into it by Oohara or Koizumi or Tomii.

I feel if the story was willing to have her outright say " Hey, I dont have expertise in this thing, you do and I wanna help (person), so I ask you to help ME " I think her tendency to do that would be better regarded because wantin to help people IS nice, but nobody ever really goes " Hey Kurita, you consistently hit off more than you can chew when you often dont have the know-how/technical skill to come through " it'd be both a way to make her come of humble and selfreflective but consistent in her genuine desire to always wanna help. Even virtue can be a character flaw, and a sin a virtue if written right. Y'know what I mean?

Instead she kind if just has a big sook and whinge til Yamaoka does the thing. Its..not endearing...at all.

Because like, she IS a reporter first, and someone with a good palete second. Yamaoka is a reporter who happens to also be sort of a Chef Prodigy. They do by definition of lived experiences and upbringings have different skillsets and ways to tackle situations. If they focused more on her specific skills nowe that shes way past being the Audience's way of looking in, I'd love that.

 

[Mugiwara325]

I feel Jante Law runs entirely opposite to say, American Exceptionalism. Also, the thing about the Jante Law IS that like..its ok if you are rich. But if you at all think its means youre above your next fella, or money and status (Professional status is ofcourse respected and listend to) means you know/matter more, thats where most Scandis will probably despise you behind your back..or openly. President Trump for example is largely detested here because he truly runs anathema to each of the points of the Jante Law list.

Also in Dan's case, the way he handled that dinner would probably to mot Swedes come off as insincere/selfpraising? Like he makes a bif speech of how " Well, I'm rich...but I'm imperfect. ". Thats not humility. Not really.

The Scandi culture waywould more be realizing that bit and....not bringing attention to it? Not in a " look at me " way but more " I'mma do better and if someone notices, thata nice. If they don, atleast I bettered myself. "

Does that make sense?


I feel if the story was willing to have her outright say " Hey, I dont have expertise in this thing, you do and I wanna help (person), so I ask you to help ME " I think her tendency to do that would be better regarded because wantin to help people IS nice, but nobody ever really goes " Hey Kurita, you consistently hit off more than you can chew when you often dont have the know-how/technical skill to come through " it'd be both a way to make her come of humble and selfreflective but consistent in her genuine desire to always wanna help. Even virtue can be a character flaw, and a sin a virtue if written right. Y'know what I mean?

Instead she kind if just has a big sook and whinge til Yamaoka does the thing. Its..not endearing...at all.

Because like, she IS a reporter first, and someone with a good palete second. Yamaoka is a reporter who happens to also be sort of a Chef Prodigy. They do by definition of lived experiences and upbringings have different skillsets and ways to tackle situations. If they focused more on her specific skills nowe that shes way past being the Audience's way of looking in, I'd love that.

The nail that sticks out is the one to get hammered, as one might say.

With Kurita, there is something of an underlying weakness in Kariya's writing that I've sort of internalized, so it's refreshing to see when others take notice of her somewhat unfair expectations on Yamaoka.
From what I've observed, Kariya has something of a problem in how he writes women. His surface text will often try to treat men and women as equals, but the recurring women characters tend to not do anything that would serve that idea. Too often, they will stay in the background and coax the men into doing what they expect men should do, which Kariya depicts as being the 'right' thing. None of his women characters have real dreams or ambitions of their own, all of them really only interested in serving their husbands' goals (Or getting a husband, as in the case of Niki and Kurita). It gets so bad that when the Culture Dept. women get together for chats, the only thing they ever chat about is love or marriage (and then piling on Kurita for loving the wrong guy).

It's especially disappointing because Kariya does occasionally write chapters where he shows that he realizes this, but he either plays it off as a joke or he forces a resolution where the woman is content to be a manservant. I don't think he's doing it on purpose, I really don't, but that just makes it so disappointing to see.

 

[d_a_renoir]

I feel if the story was willing to have her outright say " Hey, I dont have expertise in this thing, you do and I wanna help (person), so I ask you to help ME " I think her tendency to do that would be better regarded because wantin to help people IS nice, but nobody ever really goes " Hey Kurita, you consistently hit off more than you can chew when you often dont have the know-how/technical skill to come through " it'd be both a way to make her come of humble and selfreflective but consistent in her genuine desire to always wanna help. Even virtue can be a character flaw, and a sin a virtue if written right. Y'know what I mean?

Instead she kind if just has a big sook and whinge til Yamaoka does the thing. Its..not endearing...at all.

Because like, she IS a reporter first, and someone with a good palete second. Yamaoka is a reporter who happens to also be sort of a Chef Prodigy. They do by definition of lived experiences and upbringings have different skillsets and ways to tackle situations. If they focused more on her specific skills nowe that shes way past being the Audience's way of looking in, I'd love that.

Honestly, I try to not be that mean on the character because it's the fault of that utter blockhead Kariya's fault for wanting to make drama in a forced way, but this is just making Kurita look like a brainless dumbass and I'm kind of not in the mood to put up with this stupidity today.

Spoiler: I feel bad for the huge rant so I'm putting it in a spoiler box so people can skip it

She doesn't have to be a food expert herself, but she's always been present for all these food research we been reading about for 200+ chapters. There's 100+ food that she's watched the process of the making for, and listened to Yamaoka and Yuzan blab about facts during the contests. Surely she had to have at least absorbed some minimum level of knowledge by this point. Not learning anything after all this time only makes her look utterly stupid or incompetent, and we're not supposed to see her as an airheaded bimbo. She's supposed to be smart and at least capable of learning or assisting with the Ultimate Menu.

Like in that one chapter when Yuzan told her to mix a celebratory drink, when push comes to shove she clearly can do something. Not the best, but the effort was there. Why not do it for Dan, huh? It's bullshit for her to just be running to Yamaoka being like "OMFG you have to help!!" and not even bother to try to think of something herself.

It also doesn't help that she's demanding it from him in such an entitled bratty way. Sorry b*tch, shut up and do some work first yourself? Even if she herself lacks the info, it's not like she can't go to Okaboshi or the sushi lady herself to try and ask around. Those are not Special Secret Restaurants that only Yamaoka knows the address to. Those chefs are her friends now too. Or any of the other specialty chefs and farms that they previously met. As you said, she is a journalist. A good journalist would've taken note of the names of the farms and/or the phone numbers of the proprietors, since they did go to those places for work.

It's also been referenced in a few other chapters that Tozai is actually big enough to have overseas office branches. Call them then. We're not there yet in the scanlations, but in the Ala Carte books they mentioned that they actually have a French branch.

A much better plot would be like this: Kurita tried to do her own research after Yamaoka refused, then put together a special way of eating the caviar. Then she maybe asks Oohara or President Itayama to try it, since they're CEOs themselves. Her own grandma's boyfriend was a rich dude with a private villa and can be asked for advice about rich people society. Then maybe have one of them tell her it's no good. Since they're gonna focus on heart and soul and such, maybe have it so that Kurita put together some fancy French style menu but the big CEOs say "all the rich people would already be used to this, and this will not make Dan stand out". Only after that she was forced to go to Yamaoka and ask for help.

 

[keatsta]

lots of really good discussion here on the nordic character and kariya's writing of women that I don't have much to add to, but I wanna also ask - do you know if the caviar ochazuke pictured on the TL notes was created because of the manga? or did someone else independently have that idea?

 

[Mugiwara325]

lots of really good discussion here on the nordic character and kariya's writing of women that I don't have much to add to, but I wanna also ask - do you know if the caviar ochazuke pictured on the TL notes was created because of the manga? or did someone else independently have that idea?

The caviar ochazuke I showed was a menu item in the Okuhida Garden Hotel. The hotel apparently rears their own sturgeon and can serve sturgeon sashimi and other caviar dishes.
They didn't mention if their chazuke was inspired by Oishinbo.