A most enchanted café.
What They Say:
Episode #7: “Café Concrucio”
The Review
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
It never occurred to me that Chito the cat was a girl. At least, not until Nao comes over and gives her a scritch under the chin and then comments that Chito’s put on weight. The cat responds by climbing up onto Nao’s shoulders to give Noa a back ache. Well, after that Makoto actually refers to Chito as a she, so I guess Chito is a girl! Nao also asks how old Chito is, and she’s 17. After that everyone has to heap on the compliments to smooth over Chito’s hurt feelings. It looks like cats are sensitive about their weight and age as well.
It’s off to the mountains to gather herbs! Makoto, Chinatsu, Kei, Nao, and Chito depart by bus for the hills. Kei lays down the rules for foraging; everyone stays within eye-reach of each other, don’t pick more than they need, only pick the identifiable plants, and lastly to watch out for bears. They start by picking fiddleheads because the patch of woods they’re in are full of them. It turns out Nao is afraid of frogs, and much teasing is had.
The group returns home and we get to watch fiddlehead preparation. Makoto approves of the cooking, and Akane approves of them as a lunch snack to have with beer. Yes, Akane is still around and she’s day drinking. Her aunt and uncle are really nice people to let her stay for however long it’s been at this point. Chinatsu, still on her quest to become a witch, attempts to enjoy eating a fiddlehead. She eats it, but she’s still more of a fan of foraging and not eating the fruits of the labor.
Akane thinks of something that is sure to please Chinatsu’s palate and off Makoto, Kei, and Chinatsu go to find a café Akane says has wonderful cake. They arrive at the location only to find a run down old house. From there the episode takes on a wonderful Studio Ghibli-esk feel as they bypass the enchantment and find the wondrous café inside. It seems Akane either didn’t know about Kei’s fear of scary things like ghosts, or knew perfectly well. I do have to wonder about Makoto thinking it would be a good idea to make the ghost waitress visible against her wishes. Bad witch!
Make sure you stick around after the end credits for a bonus scene!
In Summary:
I think this has been my favorite episode of Flying Witch yet. The foraging out in the woods gave us a chance to see Nao again, and we got one more wild food cooking lesson. The real highlight was the trip to a very secret café, which introduced a fun new character and an amazing new location. It has the perfect mix of magical realism and comfy wonderment that makes this show an entertaining and relaxing weekend watch.
Episode Grade: A –
Streamed by: Crunchyroll
