Creative Staff
Writer/Artist:Miyuki Kobayashi / Natsumi Ando
Translated by: Satsuki Yamashita
Adapted by: Nunzio DeFilippis and Christina Weir
What They Say
Najika has a special gift. She’s a marvelous cook whose food awakens people’s fondest memories and feelings of affection. Now she’s attending the prestigious Seika Academy, where she hopes to find her “prince,” the boy who saved her when she was a little girl. One big problem: it seems that nobody wants her at the college – except two cute brothers, Sora and Daichi, who befriend her right away.
But the super-popular teen model Akane will do anything to drive Najika out of the school, even if it means staging a cooking contest with an award-winning chef as Najika’s opponent. Will Najika’s magical food warm Akane’s cold heart?
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
Thanks to Sora’s and Daichi’s support and encouragement, the new year finds Najika still doggedly attending Seika Academy. However, Akane demands that Najika prove herself worthy of being in the special class, which leads to a cooking showdown with Najika’s student status at stake! Akane’s cheap tricks abound, but thanks to both Kitazawa brothers, Najika wins outright. Her talent is finally acknowledged, earning her the acceptance of all her classmates. All of them, that is, except for Akane. But when Akane falls ill due to an eating disorder, will Najika be able to break the barrier between them with the power of her magical food?
With Volume 2, it becomes a little clearer why Kitchen Princess was rated “Teen.” The storyline stays light and fluffy up through the strawberry shortcake cooking challenge. However, once we get into Akane’s eating disorder, things become a bit more serious. It doesn’t get disgustingly graphic, but there are illustrations of Akane sticking a finger down her throat and purging in the restroom.
While Kobayashi handled the subject of Akane’s eating disorder sensitively enough, I have to wonder where she’s going with the plot. If Najika’s whole purpose for being at Seika is to find the Flan Prince, she’s not expending a whole lot of energy doing any actual investigating. In the eighth chapter, she mentions that she believes that if she can get a lot of customers at the Fujita Cafe, she can find her Flan Prince. Spending all her time cooking in the Cafe instead of following leads seems a rather convoluted strategy. Also, during Sora’s pep talk to Najika in the sixth chapter, he tells her that he has known of her and her parents since he was young and says, “I’ve been looking for you all my life.” It’s baffling that Najika doesn’t even think in that moment to confirm whether or not he is the Flan Prince.
Extras include table of contents, an explanation of honorifics, cast of characters, closing remarks from the manga’s writer, recipes for six foods made in the manga, a page of cultural notes, an untranslated preview of Volume 3, and ads for other Del Rey releases. I was surprised “Hokkaido” was defined in the translation notes but “uba” (whatever that is) was not.
Content Grade: C
Art Grade: B
Packaging Grade: B
Text/Translation Grade: B
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Del Rey Manga
Release Date: May 15th, 2007
MSRP: $10.95
