Manga / Mister Ajikko

"Mister Ajikko" is a manga series, written and illustrated by Daisuke Terasawa.

Yoichi Ajiyoshi and his mother, following Mr. Ajiyoshi's passing, run Hinode Eatery, a restaurant, together in Tokyo. On one fateful day, Genjirou Murata, head of the Ajio Company, the largest conglomerate of chefs and cooks in Japan, pays a visit to Hinode Eatery and meets Yoichi. After ordering a dish there and feeling impressed by his culinary prowess, he gives a copy of his business card to Yoichi and invites the latter to pay a visit to his company. Piqued by this unusual invitation, Yoichi obliges, and, from then on, he'd meet many others who share a passion and talent in cooking, many of whom become his challengers and/or friends through such occasions, honing his own culinary skills at the same time.

This series was included in Kodansha's shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Magazine from 1986 to 1989, with its anime counterpart running from October 1987 to September 1989.

The trope contest... BEGINS NOW!

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• A Friend in Need: Quite a few story-lines culminate in Cooking Duel because Yoichi finds out about some former business associates of his father's who need help maintaining a food-related business. The few story-lines that don't result in him getting involved in some Cooking Duel are mostly the ones where someone Yoichi knows needs help from him (e.g. having health-related issues and so needs him to make delectable dishes to help them get better).
• Brick Joke: Early in a steak Cooking Duel contest hosted in a beef conference that Yoichi signs up for, in which the material of choice is imported lean beef with no fat and the sponsor announces that the winner of said contest will receive a one-year supply of beef, he asks for a tip about how to soften foodstuff from a market owner who sells hand-harvested black soybean that he personally softens before selling. The market owner confides the secret to Yoichi after learning that Yoichi intends to apply such a method on imported lean beef and his son nudges him into revealing the method to Yoichi, and Yoichi runs home to put it to the test, though not before the market owner's son calls out after Yoichi saying that Yoichi should treat them for steak should he win the contest. After the steak Cooking Duel concludes with Yoichi as the winner, the market owner's son shows up behind Yoichi to request for some free steak.
• Camp Cook: Yoichi serves this role whenever the story requires him to cook at a campsite. Being a Supreme Chef, he's more than capable of it.
• The Cobbler's Children Have No Shoes: One Story Arc begins with Yoichi's mother watching a cooking show where a middle-aged lady talks about the types of food kids can enjoy, but Yoichi reacts with a dissenting argument not long after he starts watching. When his mother scrutinizes him on the motive for his dissenting opinion, he brings up the son of the show hostess, who attends the same school Yoichi himself goes to and looks terribly malnourished, as proof.^note  Not long afterwards, Yoichi invites the show hostess's son over for dinner, and the boy confides to Yoichi that one of the ladies studying under his mother cooks for him, but the pupil is not as good at cooking as his mother is. Shortly thereafter, Yoichi and the show hostess have a Cooking Duel, with her son as the judge. It's only after the Cooking Duel concludes that she realizes her being Married to the Job has been bad for her son's well-being.
  Yoichi: That old lady's kid... is a student at my school! That kid is nothing but skin and bones! He's too weak for anything athletic, so he's always playing in the classroom all by himself. The other day, he fractured a bone after he fell just a little, and they had to call an ambulance for that. That lady can't even take care of her own son's nutrition, so there's no way I can trust a word she says.
• Cooking Duel: The bread and butter of the series, with some exceptions.
• Creator Cameo: Terasawa's avatar (a burly guy with a full beard and eyeglasses) shows up periodically, both in the chapter title page image and as an in-story Cooking Duel spectator.
• Defeat Means Friendship: Quite a few of Yoichi's culinary rivals become pals with him after their respective Cooking Duel concludes.
• Didn't Think This Through: Occasionally, a Cooking Duel opponent will employ a culinary method in the hope of creating Impossibly Delicious Food, only to end up handing the participant in question a loss as the result of failing to account for the change in the taste of the dish in question due to time lapse.
• Disappeared Dad: Takao Ajiyoshi, Yoichi's father, has already been deceased prior to the start of the series, though what resulted in his demise has never been revealed. A story-line early in the series depicts Yoichi and his mother visiting Takao's tombstone, where Mrs. Ajiyoshi comments that it's been five years since her husband passed away.
• Droste Image: The page image of the first chapter of the first bento-related Cooking Duel shows Yoichi holding a bento... whose lid shows Yoichi holding a bento.
• Early Installment Character-Design Difference: Yoichi's mother was initially drawn with a short and plump physical shape, before it was changed into a taller and more slender appearance that remains for the rest of the series.
• "Eureka!" Moment: Whenever Yoichi is unsure about what to do to solve his culinary problems at hand, expect him to encounter something seemingly unrelated that will inspire and lead him to a needed solution soon afterwards.
• Foil:
  • Yoichi and Kazuma, both of whom are culinary prodigy at roughly the same age, have contrasting characteristics and backstories between them.
  • Yoichi is a Humble Hero because of his milder personality, whereas Kazuma is an Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy due to his more brusque attitude.
  • Yoichi was raised by his parents (and then his mother following his father's deceased status), while Kazuma was raised in an orphanage before he became Happily Adopted after a wealthy chef-turned-landowner took him in.
• Gag Nose: Marui has a large, round nose. He doesn't appreciate Kazuma addressing him as "big-nosed old man", however, with Kazuma doing so inadvertently setting Marui up as something of a Sitcom Arch-Nemesis to him (Kazuma's brusque and mouthy demeanor does him no favor, either).
• Here We Go Again!: One Story Arc later in the series starts with a young woman Yoichi meets at a campsite getting angry at her boyfriend because he promised to bring food in advance but forgot to do so until well after the fact. Yoichi spends the whole Story Arc helping them out by getting food sources and cooks for them^note  (this is one of the few story-lines with no Cooking Duel taking place throughout), only for it to end with her boyfriend scarfing down nearly all of the food Yoichi manages to scrounge up and cook for them, leaving little more than broth for her and Yoichi, and the woman chewing her boyfriend out for his act of inconsideration for anyone else.
  Yoichi: (in a resigned tone) I'm out of ideas.
• Identical Stranger: Downplayed. One contestant in the ramen Cooking Duel bears a strong resemblance to Marui (with some differences, such as hairstyles and eyebrow shapes) despite the two of them being strangers to each other^note , which Yoichi points out to Genjirou Murata in a whisper, who then relays the message to Marui, during said Cooking Duel.
• I Gave My Word: In any given Cooking Duel, those who promise to Yoichi about what they'd do should they lose to him will do precisely what they said beforehand, though some need additional prodding than others before committing to their vows. Nonetheless, they ultimately keep their promises, which is just one element that helps to cement this series on the side of idealism.
• Impossibly Delicious Food: The intended goal for many a Cooking Duel contestant.
• Invincible Hero: Downplayed with Yoichi. He has actually outright lost in some Cooking Duel contests, but the amount of times this happens can be counted with one hand, which shows just how formidable his culinary opponent at the time really is.
• It's Personal: One Story Arc early into the series is triggered due to a wealthy land owner wishing to acquire the plot of land where Hinode Eatery is located, which threatens to close down the eatery and have Yoichi and his mother evicted. Yoichi goes to confront the landowner, culminating in a Cooking Duel challenge in which Mrs. Ajiyoshi serves as Yoichi's assistant and that ends in Yoichi's victory. It's also where Yoichi meets Kazuma Sakai, who serves as his Foil, for the first time.
• Just a Kid:
  • Many a challenger who doesn't take Yoichi seriously as a culinary rival bases their attitude on Yoichi being unmistakably a minor. Naturally, Yoichi proves them wrong when the Cooking Duel takes place. This happens more so early on in the series, when Yoichi is still unknown in the culinary circles. Once Yoichi's culinary reputation starts building up, this trope occurs much less often.
  • Played for Laughs once, however, when a young woman at a camping site spots him alone and invites him over for food, shortly before her boyfriend comes back and has them Mistaken for Cheating, but he backs down after realizing his girlfriend wouldn't be romantically involved with a child that Yoichi is.
    Young woman's boyfriend: How could you bring a man here while I was away?!
    Young woman: He's just a kid!
• Kid Hero: Yoichi is the main protagonist of this series. While his exact age is not clearly stated, he's always drawn as a minor throughout the run of the series, and some other character(s) would note him as a teenager later on in the series.
• My Card: Genjirou Murata gives his business card to those whose culinary skills impress him, which he does after tasting the dish made by Yoichi.
• Player Elimination: The annual Cooking Duel being hosted by the Ajio Company eliminates the contestant that a panel of judges being randomly selected from the general populace determines to be the worst performer, one at a time, in a similar fashion to musical chairs, until only one contestant (or, in the case of both remaining contestants being judged as equally good, two) would remain as champion(s).
• Posthumous Character: Yoichi's father overlaps this trope with Disappeared Dad, as he's been dead for years before the series begin, though he still manages to remain relevant due to the combination of the Hinode Eatery under his management back when he was alive (before his death caused the ownership status to be passed on to his wife), Yoichi having gained some cooking knowledge through him, and several of his friends/associates who received help from him in the past needing help in the present time and triggering Yoichi's drive to help A Friend in Need.
• Real Men Cook: Taken to exaggerated extremes, as nearly all of Yoichi's culinary challengers are male. Yoichi himself also counts.
• The Rival: Kazuma considers Yoichi his rival and outright says so to Yoichi's face at one point.
  Kazuma: (to Yoichi) There's only one person who serves as my rival, and that's YOU!
• Satellite Character: Tareme is known as Genjirou Murata's suited-up personal secretary... and that's all we know about him, especially since he primarily interacts with Genjirou Murata and any interaction he has with anyone else, Yoichi included, is sparse at most.
• Serious Business:
  • Cooking is definitely treated as a very BIG deal.
  • More specifically, Yoichi gets very passionate about it, with his mother (at least once) having to turn his peers away when they come asking for him to play with them because he's too focused on cooking at the time for socialization.
• Sharp-Dressed Man: About the only characteristic Tareme has that is his own is that he always appears dressed in a dapper suit-and-tie outfit, as he's a Satellite Character to his boss otherwise.
• Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: Downplayed because no openly hostile exchanges have ever occurred between Marui and Kazuma, but Kazuma's brusque and mouthy demeanor simply rub Marui the wrong way as the result of Kazuma addressing Marui as "big-nosed old man" shortly after they meet for the first time. Marui, in turn, does not favor Kazuma in any subsequent Cooking Duel hosted by the Ajio Company where Kazuma is among the contestants and Marui himself is present as a spectator^note  (as an example, during one such Cooking Duel where Yoichi and Kazuma both participate later in the series, Marui actually covers his ears while there are people cheering for Kazuma, which he never does when the cheering goes for anyone else).
• Skewed Priorities: At one point during the ramen Cooking Duel, Yoichi points out in a whisper about one of the contestants and Marui, who shows up alongside Genjirou Murata as spectators at the time, being Identical Stranger to one another. Once the message is relayed to Marui, he reacts with Face Fault.
  Marui: Blazes... he said something like that in the middle of this serious tournament...!
• Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: Since almost all conflicts in this series are resolved with Cooking Duel, quite a few of which end with Defeat Means Friendship or Break the Haughty at least, and whatever promise the losing side made before said Cooking Duel started will keep it afterwards, whether by themselves or with additional prodding, this series is firmly rooted at the side of idealism.
• Story Arc: This series follows a linear progression pace.
• Supreme Chef: Yoichi, definitely. The same applies to any Cooking Duel contestant who can rival his culinary skills.
• Teen Genius:
  • If Yoichi doesn't qualify as one at the start of the series, he certainly does later on with some other character(s) noting him as a teenager, and he's certainly a prodigy in cooking.
  • Kazuma, due to being noted to be around the same age as Yoichi and a culinary prodigy in his own right, also qualifies. This is one of the ways he serves as a Foil to Yoichi.
• Voted Off the Island: Replace "island" with "contest", and this is how the Player Elimination mechanism in the annual Cooking Duel hosted by the Ajio Company works, as a panel of judges being randomly selected from the general populace serve as taste-testers and the members of the panel vote out the contestant whose dish they consider to be worst among all they had sampled at the end of each round.