The Curious Kitten at the Chibineko Kitchen

On a fall weekend in Quebec City in 2023, I devoured the Before the Coffee Gets Cold Stories by Toshikazu Kawaguchi. It was all the things I love about cozy Japanese fiction, curious, odd, well presented, and a little off key, as well as something else that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. A kindness perhaps, or a sentimental style without being too saccharine. The hours I spend idling in the Cafe Funiculi Funicula were a welcome respite from my own brand of crazy. A little repetitive maybe, sometimes simplistic, but something nice and comforting for an overtaxed brain.

With this memory stored in my heart, I entered the Chibineko Kitchen in 2025. The Curious Kitten at the Chibineko Kitchen by Yuta Takashaski carries with it the sentimentality and loose relationships with time as my beloved cafe, but with a focus on a specific set of events that was able to ground the reader more in a time and place rather than in the fantastical.

When we first encounter Kotoko, our main protagonist, she is grieving the loss of a most beloved brother and is drowning not only in her own grief and regret, but in that of her parents. Her own feelings she might be able to handle, but she is taking on the grief of her parents as well as the regrets she ascribes to them through her own guilt ridden imagination.

Through a chance encounter with an old friend, she learns of the Chibineko kitchen, a place that serves remembrance meals for those in mourning, that may allow her to speak to her brother one more time. I love the willingness with which she believes and pursues the visit offered by the kitchen. Is it the grief compelling her to an absurd hope, or an innate belief in the things of our world that we casually hide in story and myth?

Through a series of interconnected encounters we are given three chances to view the “magic” of the kitchen. But is it magic? As I think upon the story, and I have often come back to think on this story that has lingered in my soul, I wonder over the nature of magic and mythology (and magic mushrooms) in our world. Perhaps it is not the son and his mother, but some well wishing fairy. Perhaps it is not the aroma of a favorite meal, but a sprite of the ocean come to remember its own mortality. The unsaid story is as intriguing as the narrative is enchanting.

Ultimately it is the story of the boy, Taiji Hashimoto, that captured my heart. I have not lost a sibling, or a parent, but even at 43 I remember keenly the feeling of being a teenager, saying the wrong thing, dwelling on something, overreacting to something. His story is the most relatable to me. Perhaps also in his reaction to the magic I see my own temper and impatience.

The kitten played far less of a role in the story than I was anticipating which I enjoyed, because while I love cozy Japanese fiction, I do not enjoy cats or stories that center them. I was also pleasantly surprised by the inclusion of recipes for the remembrance meals.

This book was a wonderful break from reality for me, and gave me a chance to ponder one of my favorite things to ponder, where the lines of mythology, story, and reality blur, and a little magic creeps in. I am looking forward to returning to the kitchen in 2026 in The Calico Cat at the Chibineko Kitchen