How Japan claimed ramen, curry and tempura as its own despite their foreign origins
- The Portuguese gave Japan tempura, or was it the Chinese? Ramen noodles certainly came from China, and the British brought curry to Japan from India
- Over time, imported foods, dishes and cooking techniques were adopted and adapted and came to be considered Japanese. Today Indians can dine on Japanese curry
Chances are you haven’t heard of peixinhos da horta: green beans dipped in batter and fried. It’s a Portuguese dish. Fasting days, imposed by the Catholic Church and known as têmporas, on which no meat could be consumed, resulted in this dish, whose name literally translates to “little fish from the garden”.
According to legend, in 1543 a Chinese ship en route to Macau with its crew and three Portuguese travellers – António da Mota, Francisco Zeimoto and António Peixoto – was blown off course.
They landed on Tanegashima, one of Japan’s southern Osumi Islands, and were dubbed nanban (literally “southern barbarians”) owing to the direction from which they travelled.
The arrival of the British in the second half of the 19th century marked the beginning of multicultural gastronomy in Japan
They set up a trading post that brought matchlock guns, Christianity and exotic plants to Japan. The Portuguese also brought their cuisine.
“The earliest version [of tempura] in Japan was fish fried in lard and served in a broth,” says Eric Rath, professor of premodern Japanese history at the University of Kansas in the United States and the author of multiple books on Japanese food, including Japan’s Cuisines (2016).
