Anime Review: Iron Wok Jan
The Gobancho family restaurant is one of the top Chinese food places in Tokyo, serving authentic Chinese cuisine as well as innovative chef creations inspired by the Chinese tradition. The staff have a strong loyalty to the restaurant and are justly proud of their skills. So it’s an affront when a young man with an evil facial expression comes in at closing time, orders fried rice, and proceeds to declare it garbage.
Surprisingly, the head chef does not have him thrown out, much to the protests of the cook who made the dish. Instead, the stranger is allowed to demonstrate his own skills, cooking up a superior batch of fried rice. He is then revealed as Jan Akiyama, the grandson of renowned Chinese food chef Keiichiro Akiyama, who’d dropped off the radar a few years back.
Turns out he’d been training Jan as his successor, but the elder Akiyama recently died, and sent the boy to the restaurant of his great rival, Mutsumi Gobancho to finish his training and crush all opposition. So he will be working at the Gobancho from now on. Jan’s arrogance and general jerkitude don’t sit well with fellow trainee chef Kiriko Gobancho, granddaughter of Mutsumi and the presumptive heir to the restaurant.
Jan’s attitude is that “cooking is about winning”, and thrives on competing with other chefs. What is best in life for him is crushing his enemies, seeing them driven before him, and hearing the lamentations of their women. But, y’know, with cooking. Kiriko believes that “cooking is about heart”, keeping the interests of the people who are actually going to be eating the food in mind and making the experience as pleasing as possible.
An outside enemy is introduced in the person of Nichido Otani, a renowned restaurant reviewer known for having “the Tongue of God”, able to detect exactly what’s gone into a dish from a tiny taste. Because of his reputation, a bad review from him can destroy a chef or restaurant. He abuses this by demanding huge kickbacks for good reviews.
Kiriko and Jan, while not exactly working together, unite against the intruder, whipping up dishes that Otani cannot quite identify but are nevertheless exquisite. Otani vows vengeance, especially against Jan, who was super rude in addition to the humiliating experience.
This 2026 anime series is based on the Iron Wok Jan manga by Shinji Saijyo, which ran 1995-2000, and which I have reviewed a volume some time ago. This adaptation keeps the original time period, but sprinkles in updates in the narration, mentioning when a cooking sauce rare then is easily available now, discredited food theory has been discarded, and which actions are now illegal. (Nowadays in Japan, you can go to jail for serving “magic mushroom” soup.)
A couple of things make this series different than most “cooking competition” shows you might have seen. First, Jan is the character type who would normally be the villain our hero vanquishes, arrogant, overcompetitive, and willing to do collateral harm to achieve his goals. One of the episodes is devoted to a competitor who’d normally be the hero, a scrappy, friendly underdog who just isn’t ready for Jan’s cutthroat tactics. Jan suffers setbacks and consequences from his attitude, but never develops into a nicer person.
And Kiriko is unusual (especially for the time she was written) in being a female rival who doesn’t quickly get surpassed and reduced to love interest or combat commentator. She remains competitive with Jan and the other chefs in the series, and there’s never a feeling that she can’t keep up. (Mind you, since Jan’s the protagonist, if she’s not going up against him directly, we don’t usually see her contests.)
The first season of twelve episodes covers from the entrance of Jan, the introduction of the major characters (including Takao Otonagi, the third trainee at Gobancho, who is not a superskilled chef and in fact struggles even with the basics; he’s the comic relief and the closest thing Jan has to a friend), a couple of early battles, and then the first Young Chefs Competition.
The food looks scrumptious, more realistically drawn than the characters.
Content note: Suicide, Jan is physically and emotionally abused by his grandfather, male nudity (mostly from the back), animals are butchered (blood!), and some of the ingredients may be a bit icky depending on your personal tastes. Late teens will probably be okay.
This is an interesting twist on the usual cooking competition show, which may appeal to viewers looking for a less wholesome protagonist. And it’s just getting started!
