Mister Ajikko Review

Our final review today ends on food.

Murata Genjirou is the Taste Emperor of the Ajiou Company, a place where Japan's best chefs train; always looking for new talent he discovers a boy named Youichi who runs a local restaurant with his mother. Upon trying Youichi's Katsu-don, Genjirou is impressed by his skills and invites him to Ajiou to be a chef but after an altercation with an Italian chef, Youichi challenges him to a cook off, beginning a path to the top of the culinary world as he battles his way through Ajiou's chefs along with rival company chefs.
This is 80s Food Wars, no joke, this is 80s Shokugeki no Soma, it's the same plot only the protagonist is younger, the food reactions don't contain visual representations of orgasms and there's far less drama but everything else is exactly the same.
But because it is essentially Food Wars in a more primitive form it also feels dated. Youichi has confidence but acts way more immature being that he's a child and with a less well defined supporting cast, the series relies heavily on how creative Youichi can get meaning he essentially has to carry the whole anime, not helped by the fact that the only subtitled version I can find is very poorly translated.
No dub either but it was pitched to Food Network only to be turned down.
Final Verdict: Very primitive by today's standards but is an interesting anime to watch when it is basically 80s Food Wars, seeing the evolution between this show, the popular Iron Chef TV show and Food Wars makes for an interesting study in the history of Food based anime.

End