Day 25 features Shunichi Kajikawa, Executive Chef of Hoshino Resorts, who was responsible for developing the menu for the Nara Prison Museum cafe.
The decision to center the cafe menu on curry bread and cheesecake came relatively quickly. These foods represent the culinary culture that entered Japan during the modernization of the Meiji era. However, since the museum’s concept is “An Eternal Question Posed by an Iconic Prison,” simply being delicious wasn’t enough. We needed a story that would resonate with the existence of Nara Prison. This led me to the idea of a square curry bread shaped like a brick. Achieving this was surprisingly difficult; the typical jagged texture of breadcrumbs makes it hard to maintain a sharp square shape. Yet, I didn’t want to lose that signature crispiness. Balancing these two elements took nearly two years of trial and error. Our cheesecake, meanwhile, contains rice. I discovered through researching Meiji-era literature in the 1900s, that rice was sometimes used in cheesecakes back when cheese was a rare luxury. Of course, this is a cafe, so please enjoy them casually. My hope is that when you take a break after touring the museum, the sight of the curry bread allows you to reflect once more on the history of the Meiji era.
As the Executive Chef of Food and Beverage at Hoshino Resorts, Shunichi Kajikawa is involved in the development and supervision of the food and beverage departments across the entire Hoshino Resorts Group. With an extensive background in French cuisine and as a sommelier, he was the youngest ever winner of the Japan Sommelier Competition and was awarded the Chevalier of the French Order of Agricultural Merit. From 1999 to 2006, he served as the Executive Chef at Hotel Bleston Court in Karuizawa.
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