History Characters / ShokugekiNoSomaEliteTen

[[redirect:Characters/ShokugekiNoSoma]]

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[[center: [-[[Characters/ShokugekiNoSoma Main Character Index]] | [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaPolaris Polaris Dormitory]] | '''Elite Ten''' | [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaStudents Students]] | [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaTootsukiAcademy Tootsuki Academy]] | [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaOther Other]]]]-]

[[header:The Elite Ten]]
The Elite Ten Council is the prestigious student body, comprised of the best student chefs at Tootsuki and are normally drawn from the second and third year students. The council is the strongest organization of Tōtsuki, second only to the Headmaster. Even the lowest seat is considered to be extremely valuable due to the power the position holds, which includes controlling the budget, planning events, largely infinite funding to spur research and even some control over the academy staff.
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[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:In General]]

* AbsurdlyPowerfulStudentCouncil: As mentioned above, they have complete control over the funds and budget of the entirety of Tootsuki. They also have the authority to overrule the dean himself by majority vote among them.
* AuthorityEqualsAsskicking:
** The undisputed ''best'' chefs in Tootsuki, period. This also applies within the group itself, with the first seat being the best.
* AsskickingEqualsAuthority: [[spoiler:Akira earned his place in the Council by defeating many senior students in a Battle Royale between the candidates handpicked by Azami himself]].
** That is how the Rebels hope to overthrow Azami. By grabbing majority of the Council seats and impeach him.
* DefeatingTheUndefeatable: Defeating them is the protagonist's stated goal. Within the groups, the second years (6th to 9th seat) considered the third year (5th to 1st) this as well.
** Defeating the Elite Ten under Azami's rule is one of the goals of the Rebel Alliance. [[spoiler: Led by Erina and Soma, the Rebels succeed in overthrowing the Elite Ten council, and Erina supersedes Azami as dean.]]
* DubNameChange: The official translation renames them to "The Council of Ten Masters". Expect to see both that and "Elite Ten" used on Wiki/ThisVeryWiki.
* EarlyBirdCameo: The whole Council was first seen in a early manga panel where most of their designs were kept in shadow and probably not finalized yet. The anime reproduces that panel (illustrated) with the final designs, since they had by then debuted properly in the manga.
* ImprobableAge: None of them are out of high school and yet most adults defer to their authority and culinary knowledge. They also have to regularly do massive amounts of paperwork as part of the proceedings of new policies.
* MasterOfAll: Notably:
** Former 1st seat Eishi Tsukasa's specialty is french cuisine, but he does not limit himself to any style and his ability to "bring out the best from the ingredient" means his dishes are always at their best.
** Former 2nd seat Rindo Kobayashi's stated specialization is "rare ingredient" but her encyclopedic knowledge of ingredients' taste and fearless personality mean she can cook and eat anything she can.
** Former 7th seat Satoshi Isshiki, though coming from a traditional Japanese background like Nene enjoys tinkering with his dishes to develop his own style.
** Former 9th seat Eizan also does not limit himself to a single style of cooking but has encyclopedic knowledge of a variety of ingredients and techniques to best sabotage his opponents' dishes.
* MasterOfYourDomain: Regardless of generations, Elite Ten members always have some of this and some who are MasterOfAll. For the current Generation:
** 4th seat Akira Hayama's domain is spices due to his incredibly sharp nose and being the ward of a world-renowned spice researcher.
** 8th seat Terunori Kuga is a Sichuan master owing to his upbringing.
** 6th seat Alice Nakiri's domain is mMlecular Gastronomy.
** Former 4th seat Somei Saito's domain is seafood and sushi.
** Former 3rd seat Momo's domain is all manner of desserts.
** Former 3rd seat Megishima is the ramen master and acknowledged throughout Japan.
** 74th generation member Jun Shiomi was a master of spice at a very young age. It is her CripplingOverspecialization.
** 79th generation 1st seat Shinomiya Kojiro is called "Vegetable Magician" and received a cooking medal in France for his mastery of it.
* PunchClockVillain: The ones [[spoiler: who sided with Central]] aren't really evil or antagonistic at all (except [[SmugSnake Eizan]]), and some even have some bit of respect towards the rebels in their matches together.
* RagtagBunchOfMisfits: All the members of the Council are handpicked by the Academy not only for their Shokugeki records, but because every one of them has distinctive talents. Also their personalities and quirks are very distinct from one another.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Megumi Tadokoro]]
-->''Tenth seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaPolarStarDormitory Polar Star Dormitory]] page for more details''
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Alice Nakiri]]
-->''Sixth seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaStudents Students]] page for more details''
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Ryou Kurokiba]]
-->''Fifth seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaStudents Students]] page for more details''
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Akira Hayama]]
-->''Fourth seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaStudents Students]] page for more details''
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Soma Yukihira]]
-->''First seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaPolarStarDormitory Polar Star Dormitory]] page for more details''
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Etsuya Eizan]]
[[quoteright:225:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/shokugeki_etsuya.jpg]]
->'''Voiced by:''' Creator/TomokazuSugita (Japanese), Anthony Hunter (English)

Ninth Seat of the Elite Ten and a 91st Generation (2nd year) student, he's a selfish, arrogant teen with little regard for others beyond ways of making him get money. With his incredible business savvy when it comes to the culinary industry, he serves as a business consultant for many famous restaurants, food chains, produce distributors and the like, despite his age. His culinary style revolves around utilizing flavors and techniques that effectively negate the flavors of other dishes so his own stands out more.

* AlliterativeName: '''E'''tsuya '''E'''izan.
* ArmorPiercingQuestion: Soma hits him with a particularly powerful one during their Shokugeki that kicks off Eizan's big BreakTheHaughty moment.
--->'''Soma:''' [[spoiler: Does my cooking scare you, Senpai?]]
* BerserkButton:
** He hates it when anyone interferes with his plans, vowing to crush Soma for disrupting ''Mozuya'''s Sumire District branch. After failing to beat him with Subaru he instead [[spoiler:tries to break him by disbanding Polaris. That, too, doesn't pan out as he planned (no thanks to the residents' resistance), forcing him to actually try cooking.]]
** [[spoiler: After his Shokugeki with Soma, Soma himself has become his button. Just ''seeing'' him again in Chapter 204 sent Eizan into fury that caused him to emit a black haze of KillingIntent along with Eizan furiously declaring his desire to crush Soma, disturbing Nene, who was standing next to him.]]
** [[spoiler:Takumi as well, after Takumi manages to play him even ''worse'' than Soma did. When the judges are about to cast their votes, Eizan, having realized how badly he's lost, is driven to near tears as he angrily curses Takumi out]].
* BadassBookworm: He may be a smug gangster-type, but Etsuya is genuinely knowledgeable about the culinary arts and his business skills are second to none within the setting. [[spoiler:Despite having a very small Shokugeki win record, he was admitted into the Elite Ten almost purely on his business sense and advisory role alone.]]
* BitchInSheepsClothing: He's capable of acting pleasant and sympathetic when attempting to recruit new business partners, including a shopkeeper who he screwed over with his dirty tactics.
* BreakTheHaughty:
** [[spoiler:It starts in Chapter 145 with Soma's ArmorPiercingQuestion and ends in Chapter 147 due to Soma absolutely ''destroying him'' in a Shokugeki. Since then he's become much less smug and much more aggressive.]]
** [[spoiler:Takumi breaks him even ''worse'' than Soma did, if that is even possible. For details, see HumiliationConga below. As for the result, Eizan is so enraged that he's almost driven to ''tears'']].
* BrilliantButLazy: His counseling and talent with business earned him his place in the Elite Ten. However, Rindou believes that if he spent more effort on actually cooking instead of just consultation work he could easily surpass quite a few of the current Elite Ten. [[spoiler:And this is partially the reason for his loss against Soma, who even lampshades it, telling him that the next time they have a Shokugeki he'd better be serious about it.]]
* ButtMonkey: After his defeat at the hand of Soma, he became this. Central new recruits openly mocked him, the rest of the Elite 10 treated him as TheChewToy. Even the gallant Saito Soumei snarked at his expense. Very fitting given his status as HateSinks.
* TheChessmaster: His primary talent. Eizan vows revenge on Soma for ruining his plans with ''Mozuya''. However, he doesn't directly challenge people, instead preferring to set up other seemingly unrelated events to get his way. Satoshi saw his hand in arranging the Autumn Election playoff pairings such that his lackey Subaru would meet Soma at the semifinals after beating the latter's friend/rival Takumi in the most dishonorable way possible, believing Soma would accept a Shokugeki in a blind rage. This plan works brilliantly when Soma bets ''his career'' in the shokugeki, although it ends up failing when Subaru loses.
* CombatPragmatist:
** In his group Shokugeki match, he specifically uses artichokes in order to create an aftertaste that clashes with Takumi's dish. It's a dirty tactic, but it's still technically within the rules of the Shokugeki.
** In fact, this is his specific style of cooking and the source of his RedBaron. He uses his knowledge of chemicals to manipulate the taste buds of the judges and negate the flavors of his opposition. Dirty, undoubtedly, but technically not illegal.
* CorruptCorporateExecutive: His talent lies in consultation for restaurants. He uses his position as a member of the Council to manipulate (like arranging the Autumn Election matches to get Soma out of Tootsuki) and control many of the school stalls (the 20 stalls managed by him had to pay him the expensive fees). As Chapter 140 it's also revealed that [[spoiler:he's willing to rig Shokugeki by hiring corrupt judges.]]
* CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: So Rindou thinks. Despite his specialty lying in the business side of the culinary world, she assesses that were he to get serious, Etsuya ''can'' climb higher up the ranks of the Elite Ten, and that his knowledge and skill is part of why he is so good on the business end. Indeed, in his first school year, his profits were more than Tootsuki's tuition fees. ''For all of the students in his year combined.''
* DeadpanSnarker: Often retorts with one of these. When Natsume Sendawara started to complain how hard it was for her to open a slot in her agenda to be a judge of the Autumn Election, Eizan replied that she should simply have donated money instead (he later handwaved it). Also calls Kuga "midget" without cracking.
* DickDastardlyStopsToCheat: Soma notes that Eizan concentrated so much on rigging the match and breaking his enemies' spirits that he didn't sufficiently prepare for the Shokugeki. And by the time he decided to try to beat Soma in cooking, it was already too late for him to come up with a better dish.
* DisproportionateRetribution: Etsuya vows to crush Soma's spirit after he spoils his plans for ''Mozuya''. This comes off as exceptionally petty when one considers that ''Mozuya'' is just a chain restaurant, is but one of hundreds he has had a hand in operating, and that Soma had no prior knowledge of his role -- it just so happened that its new Sumire District branch was endangering established businesses in his hometown.
* DullEyesOfUnhappiness: Sports one after [[spoiler: being insulted by his Central colleagues.]]
* EvilGenius: A ruthless gang leader who is intelligent enough to work as a food consultant when he was still in middle school. Isshiki describes as an "Intellectual-type Yakuza."
* FauxAffablyEvil: Justified due to his intellectual Yakuza personality. He acts casual and polite for the sake of doing business or taunting his enemies, only to become foul-mouthed when his mood is spoiled. This is best shown when he states that he hastened the eviction of Polaris Dormitory's residents while insincerely apologizing for not mentioning it sooner.
* TheFriendNobodyLikes: Amongst the Elite Ten, no one seems particularly fond of Etsuya and some even seem pleased when he suffers humiliation. Nene shows distaste for his underhanded tactics, while Soumei admits, straight to his ''face'', that watching him lose to Takumi was ''very'' satisfying.
* FourEyesZeroSoul: His glasses often reflect, covering his eyes, which reflects his shady and manipulative personality.
* TheGlassesComeOff: When he gets serious about actually handling the dirty work himself, he takes his glasses off.
* HairTriggerTemper: He is quick to lose his temper when he's being ignored, insulted or when thing aren't going the way he wants them to.
* HateSink: He goes out of his way to be despicable as possible, being a cheating bastard who even prefers to let his opponents know that he's not playing fair. His [[ArrogantKungFuGuy over-the-top haughty attitude]] also doesn't help. Many readers just want to slap him the moment he appears. This made his defeat by Soma and Takumi very satisfying.
* HiddenDepths: Given his penchant for manipulating things behind the scenes and his focus on consultation, it's easy to overlook the fact that Eizan is on the Elite Ten for a [[SupremeChef reason]]. [[spoiler: In Chapter 144, Eizan shows off his skills and even Rindou comments that, if he actually got serious about cooking and competing with his fellow Elite Ten members, odds are that his rank would be a good bit higher than it currently is.]]
* HoistByHisOwnPetard:
** During the Autumn Election he rigs the playoffs setup such that Soma would have to face Subaru after the latter has defeated Takumi in the most dishonorable way possible, knowing Soma would be offended at the way his FriendlyRival lost. The guy bets his career as a cook on the match, but not only does he win, he also earns the respect of the entire student body that had been snubbing him up to that point, especially after his impressive showing in the finals.
** Then he gets hit with is again later [[spoiler:in his Shokugeki against Soma. The judges he asked to vote for him to teach everyone at Tootski a "lesson" ended up voting ''against'' him after Soma proves to make a better dish.]]
** [[HumiliationConga Then]] he gets a third serving of this trope when [[spoiler: Takumi Aldini defeats him in the Regiment de Cuisine by correctly predicting Eizan's method to negate his pizza's flavor and constructing it to benefit from the aftertaste instead of clashing with it. Takumi even says that he wouldn't have been able to make it so far if not for Eizan sending Subaru after him in the Autumn Election.]]
* HopeCrusher: How he tries to keep the student body in line. Because pretty much any dispute could be solved with a Shokugeki, he makes sure to set up a televised Shokugeki to make sure everyone knows how hopeless it is to fight back. [[spoiler:That is why he is so pissed and starts taking the match seriously even with the judges on his side just to crush Soma.]]
* HumiliationConga: Things just have ''not'' gone well for him ever since [[spoiler:losing his Shokugeki against Soma, which was supposed to have been ''rigged' to begin with. After that, he's constantly belittled by the other members of the Ten and Central, who won't [[NeverLiveItDown let him forget that he lost to a "little first-year."]] Then, despite being raring to go and fight Soma during the third round of matches during the Regiment de Cuisine, he gets Takumi instead, which pisses him off. Then he tries to beat Takumi by using the chemical composition of his own dish to interfere with the taste of Takumi's, only to find that Takumi read him like a book and had already adjusted his recipe to play off of Eizan's attempt at interference, which he did by applying Subaru's tactic of tracing his opponents, which Takumi only would have thought to do because he'd lost to Subraru during the Fall Classic, which Eizan had set up in an attempt to mess with Soma. Takumi then rounds things off by making Eizan realize that he's the architect of his own defeat, which is just rubbing salt in the wound at this point.]]
* IgnoredExpert: Kinu, owner of ''Mozuya'', hired him to provide advice, but ignored his warnings and as a result gets completely overpowered by Soma’s new business model.
* {{Irony}}: Eizan's modus operandi is manipulating people and events to achieve his desired results. [[spoiler: Takumi beats him by manipulating him into using ingredients that would enhance his flavors instead of negating them.]]
* ItsPersonal: Has it out for Soma ever since he ruined ''Mozuya'''s Sumire District branch, to the point that he rigged the Autumn Election playoff brackets to get rid of him. Failing that, he begins targeting Soma with all the power at his disposal [[spoiler:after voting to replace Senzaemon with Azami.]]
* {{Jerkass}}: If you haven't guessed already, he's a major prick and virtually doesn't get along with anyone, even his fellow elites. An example [[spoiler: he turns off Souma's stove for the reason of wasting gas.]]
* LaserGuidedKarma: [[spoiler:Everything having to do with his Shokugeki with Takumi is Eizan's heinous actions during the Autumn Elections coming back to bite him in the ass. Takumi wouldn't have been able to do any of what he did had Eizan not sent Subaru after him and Soma]].
* LoopholeAbuse: When he can't outright control the judges, he instead uses chemicals in his food to interfere with the taste of his opponent's food, which technically doesn't break the rules of the Shokugeki.
* TheManBehindTheMan: Shown to be this twice.
** He was behind ''Mozuya'''s expansion that almost leaves the Sumire District shops out of business. Without Eizan's advices, it quickly folded.
** It's also revealed that Eizan took Subaru under his wing and encouraged his bad behavior, letting him defeat almost a hundred students in Shokugekis.
** [[spoiler:After Azami's ascent as Dean, he hired his own judges so any Shokugeki against him by people protesting the new curriculum would always end in his favor.]]
* ManipulativeBastard: In order to get the Central judges to vote for him without tasting his opponent's dish, he plays on their devotion to Azami's elitist culinary ideology. However, he's on the receiving end of this trope when Soma basically provokes him into sabotaging his own schemes. [[spoiler: And it happens again when Takumi effectively made him defeat himself in the Regiment de Cuisine.]]
* MoneyDearBoy: Invoked. When he enrolled Tootsuki at age 12, he said that he applied because he saw it as "Profitable".
* NeverLiveItDown: InUniverse example. Whether it's his fellow Elite Ten members or other Central soldiers, absolutely nobody's letting him live down [[spoiler:his defeat by Soma's hands]], much to his ever growing chagrin.
* NightmareFace: He's normal-looking, even kind of handsome normally, but he can make some ''[[https://a.disquscdn.com/uploads/mediaembed/images/2918/2499/original.jpg ghastly]]'' expressions when he gets wound up.
* NobodyCallsMeChicken: Even though he planned to make the judges downright reject Soma's dish, Soma manages to bait Eizan by provoking him with an "Are you threatened by me?". Of course, Eizan reacts with his most pissed off face.
* OhCrap:
** He has a moment of terror [[spoiler:while struggling to comprehend how Soma could have made a far superior dish, and when he realizes the judges he coaxed in his favor all ended up voting for Soma]].
** He has another one in Regiment de Cuisine when he realizes that [[spoiler: ''he'' was the one being manipulated by Takumi instead of the other way around.]]
* OutGambitted: [[spoiler:During the Regiment de Cuisine, Eizan filled his dish with artichokes, which contain a chemical known as cyranine that messes with the taste buds to make things taste extra sweet. He counted on this to disrupt the sweet, tomato-based flavors of Takumi's Italian-style cooking by making it too saccharine to be palatable to the judges. However, Eizan didn't expect Takumi to anticipate this in advance, having spied on him and done his own research by watching Eizan's old Shokugekis. Thus Takumi modified his recipe so that it would work ''because'' [[HoistByHisOwnPetard of the fact that Eizan had loaded his dish with artichoke rather than in spite of it.]]]]
* PoorPredictableRock: When he's not bribing or verbally manipulating the judges, he mainly relies on giving his dish chemical properties to interfere with his opponent's dish. [[spoiler:This allows Takumi to predict Eizan's use of artichokes and react accordingly.]]
* RageBreakingPoint: Eizan's constant attempts to take down Soma have him increasingly frustrated with each failed venture. [[spoiler:When Soma defeats him in a Shokugeki, he reaches the breaking point, at which point all of his haughtiness is replaced by rage]].
* RankUp: [[spoiler:As of the Regiment de Cuisine, Eizan now holds the Seventh Seat on the Elite Ten.]]
* RedBaron: "Alquimista" ("Alchemist" in Spanish and Portuguese), which refers to his mastery of chemicals to transform the taste of dishes. During Shokugekis, or when he's acting as a business consultant, he uses this skill to sabotage the opposition.
* ScrewTheRulesIHaveMoney: [[spoiler:Bribes the judges to let him win Shokugeki matches. This is subverted when it turns out the judges were already loyal to Azami to begin with. In a way, this fits Eizan's character better because he managed to easily cheat the system without having to spend a single yen, which he would consider more lucrative.]]
* SmugSnake: He gets along terribly with his fellow classmates, uses people for his own gain and goes along with authorities only if they benefit him financially, even commenting that he only humors Senzaemon if the budget for the Council is still at his disposal. Unsurprisingly [[spoiler:he is part of the group who elected Azami as the new dean.]] This nets him a lot of power over the school, but [[spoiler:his composure starts to crack during his Shokugeki against Soma, when it became clear to him that the latter refuses to budge even with the knowledge that the three judges are corrupt, and his attempts at damage control only further sets up his fall after the trio gave ''Soma'' their votes.]]
* SoreLoser: [[spoiler:He really can't accept his loss against Soma. Also, being insulted by his Central colleagues doesn't help.]]
* TheStrategist: Eizan is the best food consultant in the market; in fact, ''Mozuya'' initially succeeds because of him. The minute Kinu decided not to notify him about Soma, business starts to derail.
* TeenGenius: He's already a massively profitable food consultant as a high school student.
* TokenEvilTeammate: So far, he is the only clearly evil member of the Council, only caring about money and power. While the other members are proud of their own culinary skills, Eizan doesn't care about it and doesn't hesitate to cheat and manipulate others to get what he wants.
* VillainBall: [[spoiler:Had he been not more obsessed about crushing Soma's spirit than out-cooking him, the crooked judges would have probably voted for him in the end.]]
* VillainousBreakdown: Has a small one when [[spoiler: neither Soma or the rest of the Polaris dorm are going to back down from his attempts to tear down their dorm. Its at this point, he decides to take his Shokugeki against Soma seriously to crush his spirit once and for all. Except it didn't work, and he had a ''much'' bigger breakdown when the rigged Shokugeki ended in Soma's crushing victory.]]
* WeakButSkilled: In Eizan's own words, he prefers the business and economical side of cooking than the sport of it. That said, he's still able to make pretty exceptional dishes based purely on his cooking knowledge. [[spoiler: This was ultimately his undoing in his match against Soma. While Eizan made a great dish that was well put together and tasted great, Soma's more creative and practical approach to cooking let him make a much better tasting dish despite lacking anywhere near the amount of knowledge that Eizan had.]]
* WeCanRuleTogether: He offers Soma a spot on his marketing team, which the latter rejects after realizing he's the one who almost contributed to the economic crisis in his neighborhood.
* WillfullyWeak: He deliberately avoids confronting opponents directly with his own cooking in order to prove his chops as a first-rate manipulator. This comes back to bite him in the ass during his Shokugeki with Soma. [[spoiler: Because he didn't take the match seriously until it was already underway, deciding his dish on the spot without bothering to make any preparations, he ends up losing to Soma's more carefully prepared and creative dish. Despite that, he still managed to produce a spectacular dish. Even Soma notes that, had Eizan been taking the match seriously from the get-go and bothered to make preparations or used his "specialty," the outcome would have probably been much different.]]
* {{Yakuza}}[=/=]JapaneseDelinquents: Rumor has it that he may be one because of his influence as a food consultant. He also has the look of a Japanese yankee.

[[folder:Terunori Kuga]]
[[quoteright:225:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/4b15112bdc9a77d0b7964b371d227828.png]]
->'''Voiced by:''' Creator/YuukiKaji

Eighth seat of the Elite Ten and a 91st Generation (2nd year) student, who was first introduced in the Autumn Leaf viewing event. He's a loud, boisterous student with a very outgoing personality who specializes in Chinese cooking, particularly spicy Szechuan dishes, and is the head of the Chinese Cuisine Research Society.

* AnimalMotifs: He was associated with a lion, while Soma was, at the time, a stray cat against him.
* AnimeHair: Sports a two-colored hair that is exaggeratedly spiky in its style, at least compared to most of the other cast.
* BerserkButton: His height. He appeared to take Eizan's insults quite well until the latter called him a "midget." He also boasts that he would accept a shokugeki from any of the first years who could beat him in something cooking-related and Nene mentions "height." He doesn't respond well.
* TheBusCameBack: [[spoiler:In Chapter 180, Kuga and his RS members give Soma a plethora of spices for brainstorming a bear meat dish.]]
* CripplingOverspecialization: During the Full Moon Banquest festival, his booth specializes in one specific dish. While it's ''very'' good, it's also so spicy that a lot of people just can't handle it, allowing Soma to poach away more and more of his customers as the festival goes on. Further, he's using cooks that had to be extensively drilled in order to cook his mapo tofu, meaning that he can't prepare a new dish or anything to counter Souma's extensive menu.
** Kuga himself seems to acknowledge this after his loss to Eishi during his first year. [[spoiler:During the Regimental Shokugeki, he eventually subverts this by employing French techniques to his usual Szechuan cooking.]]
* CrocodileTears: PlayedForLaughs. Soma and even his own club members lampshade how insincere he is when he gets all teary-eyed. When he shows genuine sympathy or rage, his expression is nowhere near as cheesy as when he fakes it.
* DeathGlare: Glares at Soma after he points out that he has far more experience than him in running a restaurant.
* DrillSergeantNasty: He's very strict about training his club members to cook uniformly. This is also PlayedForLaughs when he makes them sing a military cadence while carrying a huge pillar.
* EstablishingCharacterMoment: His passive-aggressive personality is quickly made clear when, upon arriving to the leaf viewing event, he immediately suggested the first years to just call it a day and go home, and loudly wonders if the school can just cancel the event altogether as a waste of time.
* EveryoneHasStandards:
** Despite complaining about formalities and all the traditions Senzaemon made them fulfill (like the Red Leaf Hunt), he was clearly upset over [[spoiler:his fellow Council members voting Azami as new dean, and even boycotts subsequent meetings. This makes sense because, as head of the Chinese RS, Azami's reforms could doom his club. Unfortunately, this makes Azami remove him from the Elite Ten]].
** In Chapter 184, he's outraged upon learning that [[spoiler:Azami blackmailed Akira into joining Central by holding Jun's research hostage]].
* GracefulLoser: Even though he was pissed when he first realized that Soma beat him at fourth day sales, he seem to have accepted the results the next day, and even acknowledged that the latter is just going to improve.
* HotBlooded: Speaks out most of his dialogues by shouting them, and very quickly gets into fights with both Nene and Eizan.
* IronicEcho:
** Invoked by Rindou when she gets a rise out of the fact that Kuga issued the same challenge the previous year at the Red Leaf Viewing Festival that Soma did in the current year. The difference being that it actually worked when Kuga did it, but when Soma does it, Kuga himself refuses to accept it.
** His stated reason for opposing Central is because he finds their regime boring, which is similar to how Rindou supports them for fun.
* JerkassFacade: As soon as he is introduced, he acts passive-aggressively hostile towards the entire first year class and mocks Soma at every opportunity. He also spares no opportunity to gloat about the profits he's making during the festival (and other's lack of profits). However, once Soma gains his respect he tones the jerky behavior down and shows that he has his reasons for his behavior.
* MasochistsMeal: His cooking is painfully spicy, but it's so good that people can't stop eating it.
* MoodSwinger: He is a roller coaster of emotions. While scolding one of his staff members, he started with a childish whine, and instantly changed into a more menacing tone when he assigned 30 more repetitions. And then changes to an excited mood when he invites Miyoko once again to join the club. He also blows up if anyone mentions how short he is.
* MultiColoredHair: Has brown hair, and blond bangs.
* TheNapoleon: He is boisterous, loud, likes to berate his opponents and takes it very badly whenever others mock his height.
* TheNicknamer: He calls Soma "Yukihira-chin" and Eishi Tsukasa "Tsukassan".
* NoIndoorVoice: Almost everything he says is in shouts.
* NotSoDifferent: With Soma. It's shown that he was a lot like Soma in his first year, even having [[spoiler:''also'' challenged the Elite Ten with the exact same words Soma used to challenge him]]. Soma also mentions that he could also relate to his delight on seeing people's reactions to his cooking.
* OutOfFocus: After Azami takes over Tootsuki, he doesn't appear again and is only mentioned by the other members of the Council, [[spoiler:and we don't even see his reaction after being booted out of the Elite Ten]]. Then he and his club return to help Soma brainstorm a dish for [[spoiler:his rematch against Hayama]].
* ThePromise: He is shown making one with Eishi before the Full Moon Banquest festival. It turns out that [[spoiler:the promise was for Eishi to agree to a shokugeki if Kuga manages to lead the central area standings for five days straight, because Kuga wants to avenge his brutal loss to Eishi the year prior.]]
* TheProudElite: He's very blatant in flaunting his position as a member of the Elite Ten, and would repeatedly remind Soma and the other first years how much they are above the rest of the Tootsuki students.
* {{Sadist}}: A downplayed example. The main reason he prefers Szechuan Cuisine over all of the other styles in general Chinese Cuisine is because he enjoys when his customers sweat and get red because of his food, as the sting is so deep and yet they keep eating.
* SecondPlaceIsForLosers: He aimed to have first place for five consecutive days of the Full Moon Banquet and gets really pissed when Soma broke his streak on the fourth day. He has his reasons.
* SixthRanger: [[spoiler:Joins the remaining rebels in their Team Shokugeki against Central]].
* SpoiledBrat: He tells Soma that his love for Szechuan cuisine comes from his many travels to China, which tipped Soma about his rich background. While they were hiking in the mountains, Terunori started to whine wanting milk tea instead of the coffee.
* TeensAreShort: The shortest male member of the Elite Ten.
* UnsportsmanlikeGloating: He often speaks to his rivals with a condescending and passive-aggressive tone. Being TheProudElite, he seems to enjoy gloating at Soma when observing the latter trying, and seemingly failing, to challenge him. During the first day of the Moon Banquet Festival, he approached Soma and Megumi to "compliment" their low sales, only to rub in their faces the mountain of tickets he got, thus the look of surprise on his face when he discovers that Soma managed to make a big leap from 40th (last) to 35th place on the second day. However, during the fourth day, he's unable to keep up with Soma's completed booth, despite having far more resources, staff and preparation at his disposal and there's apparently nothing he can do to fix the situation. His perfect streak of top sales is broken and he's ''pissed''.
* VerbalTic: Has a habit of repeating certain words for emphasis, e.g. "I really, really, really mean it!"
* TheWorfEffect: Backstory-wise, we see how big of a threat Tsukasa is by the fact that he defeats Kuga 5-0 in a Shokugeki. Although Souma manages to outsell Kuga on the second-to-last day of the Moon Banquet festival, it was only through the intervention of his friends at the last minute.
----

[[folder:Satoshi Isshiki]]
-->''Seventh seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaPolarStarDormitory Polar Star Dormitory]] page for more details''

[[folder:Nene Kinokuni]]
[[quoteright:225:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/4fdb7a7630374ae15d4e769becdbd679.png]]
->'''Voiced by:''' Creator/KanaHanazawa

Sixth seat of the Elite Ten and a 91st Generation (2nd year) student, who was first introduced in the Autumn Leaf viewing event. She's a prim and proper young lady who has trained diligently on cooking and many Japanese traditions since a very young age. She specializes in traditional Japanese cooking, with soba noodles being her specialty.

* AllForNothing: Despite being a proud member of the Elite Ten, her childhood training to become a top-ranking chef proves to be useless when [[spoiler:her own restrictions in following solely on her family cooking style without considering on improvements outside her family teaching backfires on her ''big time'' during her match with Soma.]]
* AlwaysSecondBest: Similar to Gin Doujima and Jouichirou Saiba, [[spoiler: the seats of Isshiki and Nene do not represent who the better cook actually is. Isshiki just has a lower seat because he never takes things seriously, which just frustrates her even more given how hard she works.]]
* AppealToTradition: This is Nene's stance on cooking. Make no mistake, her Japanese cuisine ''is'' exceptional and of outstanding quality, but it turns out to be a fallacy, because Nene is stuck up believing that it is the only correct way to cook.
* ChildhoodFriends: With Isshiki. She doesn't agree that they were "friends".
* CripplingOverspecialization: A DoubleSubversion. While her specialty dishes are Soba Noodles, she claims to have knowledge in a variety of dishes which would make you think she avoids this trope. However, she's only ever focused on what she was taught by her family and never thought of any ways to innovate her dishes or the effect it'd have on the people who eat them. [[spoiler: And that's how she ultimately loses to Soma in the Regimental Shokugeki, because she was so focused on adhering to her traditions that she completely failed to realize the effect the cold environment would have her dish's taste, and thus it losing its flavor compared to Soma's]].
* DeadpanSnarker: Very cold and blunt when putting down someone, particularly towards Kuga.
-->'''Kuga''': (To Soma) If you surpass me in anything related to cooking, I'll gladly accept your challenge.
-->'''Nene''': Height.
-->'''Kuga''': I SAID "RELATED TO COOKING", HAG!!
* DeathGlare: A master of these.
* FatalFlaw: Her weakness is to strictly [[AppealToTradition follow the teachings of her family]], which were seemingly perfected over generations, down to a T, without any concern about her customers, or any thought of improvising and changing anything. This is the reason many oppose Central and Azami Nakiri's new policy at Tootsuki. [[spoiler: Unlike Soma, Nene didn't adapt to the environment, and so her "perfect" soba lost part of its flavor, while Soma's soba flavor managed to stay powerful.]]
* FirstNameBasis: In the past with Satoshi Isshiki, as Isshiki left his house to train with the Kinokuni family when he became four years old. [[spoiler: Their relationship quickly got colder when Nene became envious of his talents, as he quickly and casually surpassed her in everything she trained for.]] Nowadays they call each other by their family names.
* {{Foil}}: To Satoshi Isshiki. They share similar backgrounds, yet are very different at the same time. Both are children to two of Japan's foremost culinary families, the Kinokuni of the East (Tokyo) and the Isshiki of the West (Kyoto). While Nene is stoic and cold, Isshiki is kind and warm. Nene loves the tradition her family passed on to her and spent her life happily studying it, while Satoshi seems to be on bad terms with his family being the BlackSheep of the family. This is shown in their cooking, as Nene follows what she was taught to the letter and has perfectly mastered it while Satoshi likes to modify and play with recipes to the point that his food doesn't really follow any cultural guidelines and is just his.
* GracefulLoser: [[spoiler: Despite being frazzled about the fact that Soma's soba has superior flavor to hers, when Isshiki and the judges point out the flaw in her methods and her dish, she does acknowledge that she lost and makes no further arguments or tantrums]].
* HardWorkHardlyWorks: The reason why Nene isn't on friendly terms with Isshiki. [[spoiler: He may have been on a lower seat than her, but everyone in the Elite Ten knew Isshiki is only the 7th seat because he doesn't give it his all. Isshiki outclasses her seemingly casually in everything she trained for years, which makes her feel pathetic.]] [[spoiler: It then turns out that her hard work doesn't work because she merely did exactly what she was taught. All she did was recreate the dishes that her family considered to be the best, not caring whether it will actually bring out the best flavor for her customers.]]
* {{Hypocrite}}: For a chef who wants to fight honorably and dislikes anyone who jeers at Soma, she ironically isn't above all in belittling Soma, due to her overconfidence in her cooking.
* IceQueen: She's rather cold and harsh most of the time, including insulting a crowd that was cheering for her because they were being vulgar.
* LonelyRichKid: Subverted. As a child, Nene had no time to play with other children because her schedule was filled with various traditional Japanese lessons. Turns out, she enjoyed these lessons so much, she didn't actually feel lonely at all.
* NotSoAboveItAll: She's just as awkwardly surprised as everyone else in chapter 207 when Soma draws "Soba" as their theme ingredient, which happens to be her specialty.[[spoiler: In Chapter 213 and 214, Nene is shocked to hear the judges' verdict, regarding her and Soma's soba dishes. When Isshiki explains her FatalFlaw, she has to admit that Soma is superior to her.]]
* NotSoStoic:
** Nene finally shows emotion In chapter 202, after [[spoiler: Tsukasa tells Eizan that it would be problematic if he lost again]], Nene is seen trying very hard to hold in her laughter, and she also snaps at Eizan after he throws down her cell phone, making it the very first time she ever raises her voice.
** [[spoiler:She is utterly confused when Isshiki predicts that she will lose her duel to Soma. Later on, the judges' positive reactions towards Soma's fried Soba only add to her confusion and disbelief. When the judges declare Soma's Soba to be better, she is devastated, as she overlooked a fatal factor that influenced her dish, while Soma took their circumstances under consideration and produced a better flavor.]]
** [[spoiler:Nene blushes and tears up when Satoshi tells her how much he respects and admires her drive, despite always coming up short against him]].
* OhCrap: When she realizes that [[spoiler:her soba didn't amount to Soma's]].
* TheStoic: She doesn't raise her voice while having a verbal smackdown against Kuga, and responds to his shouts by coldly saying, "Die".
* TemptingFate: An oddly positive version of this. During her match against Soma she declared she would defeat him regardless of the main ingredient, right after Erina explained her specialty in Japanese cuisine and more specifically Soba noodle. Three guesses on what ingredient Soma draws from the lot.
* {{Tsundere}}:
** She shows signs of this; when Subaru tried to trace her, he completely turned into a tsundere.
** [[spoiler:This nature is only more pronounced during Isshiki's match with Tsukasa, where he reveals to her that ''she'' was his inspiration for his love of cooking, an admission that deeply touches her to the point of tears. When he loses the match and notices how intently she's looking at him, she fervently denies any concern she has over him]].
----
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Alice Nakiri]]
-->''Sixth seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaStudents Students]] page for more details''
----
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Ryou Kurokiba]]
-->''Fifth seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaStudents Students]] page for more details''
----
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Akira Hayama]]
-->''Fourth seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaStudents Students]] page for more details''
----
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Soma Yukihira]]
-->''First seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaPolarStarDormitory Polar Star Dormitory]] page for more details''
----

** 1st seat Eishi Tsukasa's specialty is french cuisine, but he does not limit himself to any style and his ability to "bring out the best from the ingredient" means his dishes are always at their best.
** 2nd seat Rindo Kobayashi's stated specialization is "rare ingredient" but her encyclopedic knowledge of ingredients' taste and fearless personality mean she can cook and eat anything she can.

** 9th seat Eizan also does not limit himself to a single style of cooking but has encyclopedic knowledge of a variety of ingredients and techniques to best sabotage his opponents' dishes.

** 9th seat Akira Hayama's domain is spices due to his incredibly sharp nose and being the ward of a world-renowned spice researcher.

** 6th seat Nene Kinokuni's domain is traditional Japanese food and is the absolute best at traditional Soba.
** 4th seat Somei Saito's domain is seafood and sushi.
** 3rd seat Momo's domain is all manner of desserts.

[[folder:Ryo Kurokiba]]

[[folder:Soma Yukihira]]
-->''First seat of the Elite Ten. Please see [[Characters/ShokugekiNoSomaPolarStarDormitory Polar Star Dormitory]] page for more details''

[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/elite_ten_council.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:'''Members left to right:''' Etsuya Eizan, Nene Kinokuni, Rindou Kobayashi, Momo Akanegakubo, Eishi Tsukasa, Tosuke Megishima, Erina Nakiri, Terunori Kuga, Satoshi Isshiki, Soumei Saitou]]

[[folder:Erina Nakiri]]
[[quoteright:225:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/146688a9c07f0c4b972c48fd9c4c379e.jpg]]
->'''Voiced by:''' Creator/MaiNakahara (vomic), Creator/RisaTaneda (anime, 2015-16), and Creator/HisakoKanemoto (anime, 2017-present) (Japanese); Stephanie Wittels (English)

The granddaughter of school headmaster Senzaemon Nakiri and daughter of Azami Nakiri, Erina is the Tenth Seat of the Elite Ten despite being a freshman (and thus its youngest member), also known as "God's Tongue" for her incredibly refined palate. Proud, distant and somewhat petty, she doesn't take well to the fact that Soma, a commoner transferee, was able to cook up something that actually met her incredibly high standards, and thus tries to have him expelled or neglected whenever possible. In the meantime, she keeps mostly to herself, only interacting with her aide Hisako or squabbling with either Soma or her cousin Alice. There's more to it than what she appears to be, however...

* AcademicAlphaBitch: What sets her apart from most of the student body, aside of her family name and reputation, is also her talent level, and she is very aware of this. After her CharacterDevelopment settles in, she becomes a LovableAlphaBitch.
* TheAce: Erina belongs to the elite Nakiri family and was a ChildProdigy. She is very popular at Totsuki and is held with high regard. She also made it to the Elite Ten in her First Year itself. She is so talented that she defeated the 3rd Seat Momo Akanegakubo in her own speciality. Teaming up with Soma, they were able to defeat [[spoiler: Eishi Tsukasa (1st Seat) and Rindou Kobayashi (2nd Seat) in the Regimental Shokugeki.]]
** [[spoiler: On Sōma's and Senzaemon's suggestion, Erina became the new Headmaster at the age of sixteen. Just towards the end of her first year in Tōtsuki High]]
* {{Adorkable}}: In contrast to her public persona, she reverts to this pretty much any time where she tries to act her age or when she's around the few people she's actually comfortable with. These behaviors include being overly excited by normal activities like card games, an inability to operate basic machinery (such as a washing machine) or failing to understand where to buy a volume of manga. At one point she gives a series of lectures to the Polaris dorm members and shows up to them dressed in a risque teacher's cosplay outfit with tight hair-bun and glasses (despite her not actually needing glasses). The dorm members comment on how unusual the getup is, but she doesn't seem to notice. She also had an unusually cute look of concern for Soma after [[spoiler:finishing her task for the third Promotion Exam and rushes to see how he fared]].
* AlmightyJanitor: It's implied that Erina's much better than her rank would imply, only having the tenth seat because she didn't bother aiming any higher. When her ability is finally put to the test, [[spoiler:she beats master patissiere and fourth seat Momo Akanegakubo on her home turf with a spur of the moment dish built around ''proving a point'' rather than being the absolute pinnacle of her ability.]]
* AlwaysSomeoneBetter: Whenever the story praises the other first years, it usually does it in a way like 'they might be the best in their year... after Erina Nakiri' or 'they might have talent that could come close to Erina Nakiri eventually.' How the other characters react to that really says a lot about them. Hayama sees her as a major rival while Alice gets frustrated at being unable to match up, but lacks the passion to really improve herself. Her aide Hisako doesn't even ''want'' to compete with her. Souma, for his part, seems to view her as a ''stepping stone'' on the way to his actual goal and doesn't even give her the same kind of acknowledgement that Hayama does.
* BadassBoast:
** In chapter 204, she gives one to Azami [[spoiler:when she resigns from the Tenth Seat of the Elite Ten]].
** She does it again in chapter 244, before her bout against Momo:
--> '''Erina''': You seem to be in an awfully sour mood. But you should be thankful. Because I, Nakiri Erina, am about to grace you with a lesson.
* BadLiar: When she bumps into Soma during training camp, she’s humming and cheerful, which she finds embarrassing. She futilely tries to deny it, but not only does he not believe her, she can't even distract him. She also tells Soma his entrance exam dish was bad, despite her internal monologue and reaction making it clear she enjoyed the dish.
* BeatThemAtTheirOwnGame: As part of her AcademicAlphaBitch personality, she took on Chan RS (a club specialized in chanko nabe, a traditional pot dish most frequently associated with sumo wrestlers) in their own specialty, crushing them with ease to make room for another one of her food labs. [[spoiler:To avenge Megumi, she goes against Momo Akanegakubo, the best patissier at Tootsuki, head-on in a battle of pastries, adapting her own version of Megumi's dorayaki in her "Soufflé Léger de Grâce", to beat Momo 3-0 during the Regiment de Cuisine.]]
** Soma invokes and outright ''weaponizes'' this during [[spoiler:the final round of the Regiment de Cuisine. After producing an appetizer that's too powerful to be anything except a main dish, which, given the format of the competition, would automatically result in a loss for them, Soma turns it around and uses his own dish to challenge Erina, forcing her to produce a main dish that can stand up to, match with, and surpass his appetizer, essentially forcing her to beat ''Soma'' at his own game in order to effectively win. The resulting dish succeeds by virtue of Erina drawing upon many of Soma's off-the-wall improvisations and creative tricks to perfect its flavor.]]
* BecauseYouWereNiceToMe: [[spoiler:Erina's decision to help the residents of the Polaris dorm with the Promotion Exams stems from her desire to repay them for the kindness they've shown her since taking her in. She is willing to do ''anything'' to make sure they become second years -- including challenging her father and giving up her seat on the Elite Ten]].
* BerserkButton: After their encounter at the admission test, anything that reminds her of Soma Yukihira makes her furious. At first. [[spoiler:This changes after she is taken in by the Polaris dorm. Her attitude regarding Soma gradually begins to soften, and after Soma cooks for her and reminds her ''why'' she wanted to learn how to cook in the first place, her hostility disappears completely. Now, she all but demands that he become a second year alongside her, making it clear that she sees him as a dear friend]].
* BlessedWithSuck: Her greatest skill is her hypersensitive palate; while on the surface this seems like an incredible gift for a chef to have, in practice it leads her to actually dislike cooking because she can taste flaws in almost every dish.
* BorrowedCatchphrase: [[spoiler: Uses Soma's "It wasn't much" one-liner after she beating Momo, albeit in a much more polite fashion to fit her ojou image. Soma is very quick to point this out and tease her about it, which she vehemently denies naturally.]]
* BrokenAce: Erina is an incredible cook with a godly palate that can detect almost any imperfection in a dish, is the youngest member and only freshman of the Elite Ten, and is predicted by culinary experts to be on the route to becoming the greatest chef of her generation. However, she's also socially isolated and was psychologically and physically abused as a child, leading to lasting effects on her personality. Also, the talents she was naturally born with actually make her dislike cooking to an extent because it means ''everything'' she eats tastes flawed to her.
* BrutalHonesty: She is very direct when sampling food and in pointing out flaws, even to her closest friends. The only occasion shown in which she outright lies about food quality is during Soma's entrance exam, at which her lie was caused by Soma's perceived arrogant behavior and lack of respect (which in turn was partially driven by Erina's attitude).
* CallingTheOldManOut: She finally calls on Azami when [[spoiler:the latter attempts to convince her to turn to Central to the point that she resigns from the Elite Ten]].
* CharacterDevelopment:
** Initially, she was presented as an entirely antagonistic character bent on exacting revenge on Soma (by trying to have him expelled from the school) for his perceived slight on her reputation. However, as the series progresses and her character arc is fleshed out, she stops focusing on the revenge/expulsion angle and instead avoids him as much as possible and gets irritated when she can't. [[spoiler:As a temporary Polaris tenant, she also gradually realizes that she still has a lot to learn after seeing Soma, Megumi and their friends brainstorm culinary ideas together, finding new and creative ways to make dishes work rather than stick to one single way like Erina is used to doing or having people do to try to please her.]]
** After [[spoiler: Souma's cooking reminds her of her lost passion for cooking, she decides to rally LaResistance against Azami's regime and effectively becomes its leader. She even stands up to her father right in his face by resigning from the Elite Ten and defeats Momo in a manner very inspired by Souma's usual tactics, right down to [[BorrowedCatchphrase borrowing his catchphrase]] at the end (not that she'd admit to the inspiration).]]
* ChasteHeroine: Erina initially does not understand the appeal of romance. When Alice teases her about it, Erina talks about her admiration for Jouichirou instead (which turns out to be more of a form of hero-worship). However, she later is seen blushing and engrossed in a romance manga which Alice gives her.
* TheChosenOne: As the Nakiri family heiress, she's been groomed to eventually take over the family when her grandfather eventually retires and is considered by many to be potentially the greatest chef that will come out of Tootski. Her father even explicitly calls her the "key" that will lead a new generation of chefs because of her abnormal sense of taste that lets her breakdown and understand almost every dish she comes in contact with.
* TheComicallySerious: She decides to give special lectures to Soma and the Polaris Dorm. How? By dressing like a HotTeacher (complete with [[{{Meganekko}} glasses]], tight skirt and heels). Although she doesn't seem to mind, the others quickly note the risky getup and if it was really necessary for study sessions.
* ComicallySmallBribe: She typically requires an exorbitant consultation fee to test anyone's food and provide feedback. However, when Soma makes an off-hand remark that someone in the dorm has all of the volumes of the shojo manga she's reading, she agrees to taste his food if he lends her the remaining volumes since she doesn’t know where to get them by herself.
* CordonBleughChef: [[spoiler:As a giant middle finger to her father's philosophy, her main dish in the finale of the Regiment de Cuisine incorporates aspects of two of Soma's most infamous dishes: Soma's disgusting peanut butter-squid combo (which she managed to make delicious) before adding the Transforming Furikake of the dish Soma served her as part of his entrance exam as the finishing touch, blowing even Azami away with how ridiculously well the flavors came together.]]
* CovertPervert: Although her first reaction to finally seeing Isshiki in his NakedApron is to exclaim that it's vulgar, she kept looking while Hisako tried telling her to not do it.
* CryCute: The usually haughty Erina tears up in despair after [[spoiler:Azami declines to rescind all his expulsions (especially Hisako and Alice)]], before Soma steps in her defense and [[spoiler:outright challenges Azami and his loyalist Elite Ten into a team Shokugeki]].
* DarkAndTroubledPast: [[spoiler:After Alice left for Denmark, Azami began "training" her to be intolerant of "imperfect" dishes by locking her in a dark room, forcing her to judge dishes and having her throw any dish that was less than perfect. If she would disobey, he would hurt her. This continued until she was completely brainwashed to behave like him. She barely started to recover after Senzaemon's intervention (which resulted in Azami's expulsion from the family), Alice's return and Hisako's support, but the trauma still haunts her and she is still very picky about the food she judges. In fact, Azami's abuse was so bad that it made her forget ''why'' she wanted to cook in the first place, admitting that she has never really enjoyed cooking. Erina does eventually call Azami out on his abuse by the time chapter 204 rolls around]].
* DefectorFromDecadence: She leaves the Elite Ten to side with her friends [[spoiler:once she decides she's had enough of Azami's abuse]].
* DefrostingIceQueen: She's rather aloof and isolated by default, but when people make an effort to get to know her she actually warms up quickly and turns out to be pretty nice, if a little socially awkward and sheltered. She also ends up becoming particularly close to Souma after finally making the effort to get to know and understand him, though [[{{Tsundere}} she doesn't like for people to notice]] and they still tend to bicker. But even so she can openly admit that she cares about him and doesn't want him to get expelled.
* {{Deuteragonist}}: Promoted to this role after the Moon Banquet festival when her father takes over the school. From that point, her CharacterDevelopment takes center stage alongside Soma's conflict against Central. To the point where [[spoiler: she, not Soma, is the one poised to serve the main dish of the final battle against Central's Elite 10.]]
* DislikesTheNewGuy: At first, Erina makes no secret of hiding how she resents Soma to the point that it becomes a temporary BerserkButton. Eventually, she drops her haughty attitude and becomes one of Soma's close friends.
* TheDogBitesBack: At the end of chapter 204, [[spoiler:she decides she's had enough of Azami and quits the Elite Ten]].
* DramaticIrony: She looks up to Jouichirou as the ideal chef and denounces Soma's trial-and-error approach, completely unaware that Jouichirou ''raised'' him to be like that in the first place. [[spoiler:Her face when she does finds out their connection is priceless.]]
* TheDreaded: Dozens of aspiring Tootsuki transferees would rather quit than take her cooking test, because being branded as someone without talent by her would be tantamount to a culinary death sentence.
* DudeMagnet: Her looks and status make her popular, but her fearsome reputation, bad temper and abuse of authority keep her isolated from those who may admire her.
* DynamicCharacter: When Erina was a child, while being very [[BrutalHonesty brutally honest]], she still was a very cheerful girl with a kind heart. After Alice left for Denmark and Azami took over her education, she was shaped into a cruel elitist. It took her a long time to return to her original self, which starts with Jouichirou inspiring her by showing how fun cooking could be, and later supported by her grandfather and Hisako's friendship. It's not until she takes shelter at Polaris, befriends its tenants, realizes that Alice always loved her the whole time and [[spoiler:Soma reminded her of Jouichirou's cooking that she decides to actively oppose her father and fight to free Tootsuki from him]].
* EstablishingCharacterMoment: Erina's first shot in the series is her tossing away a plate of food in disgust, effectively encapsulating her personality as a chef.
* EvenTheGirlsWantHer: Nao is creepily obsessed with her and wants Erina to "scold her," and early on Hisako is also shown to be enthralled by her (although these elements are toned down to a normal friendship later on).
* EveryoneHasStandards: She steadily grows disgusted by [[spoiler:Azami's brutality and views towards cooking]], eventually leading to her [[spoiler:sheer refusal to join Central and resigning from the Elite Ten to side with her friends]].
* EvilIsPetty: While not necessarily ''evil'', her attitude at the start of the series (at least until her DarkAndTroubledPast is explored in full) doesn't give her a very good reputation: She's haughty, overly-critical, and tried to keep Soma from getting into the school ''solely because he made a common dish'' instead of trying to be fancy like all of the other applicants. Her multiple efforts to get him expelled after he still manages to get in also help with this, and she makes a habit of beating down clubs that she finds unnecessary in order to make food labs. She has at least five.
* {{Foil}}: To two characters.
** Soma -- As one of his most prominent rivals, Erina embodies the complete opposite of everything he stands for. Where he values experimentation and culinary diversity, she values only perfection and gourmet food. Their contrast becomes more prominent following Stagiaire Month: where Erina expands her influence by strong-arming Research Societies she thinks aren't useful into challenging her to losing shokugekis, Soma does so through hard work and attracting enough attention from his peers and upperclassmen, enough to earn shokugekis. [[spoiler:This also extends to both their upbringing and relationship with their fathers: where Soma naturally cultivated his talent through observing, emulating and challenging Jouichirou, which nevertheless developed a genuine bond between them, Erina was forced by Azami to develop her God's Tongue in a way that, while made her one of the best (if not ''the'' best) chefs of her generation, left her psychologically scarred and her relationship with her father being built on fear and control.]]
** Megumi -- A subdued example compared to that with Soma (more so after they became amicable following their Stagiaire Week pairing), but the contrast still exists. In terms of cooking, Erina specializes in technical and elegant Western dishes with powerful impact, whereas Megumi does so with down-to-earth and homely Japanese dishes with a soothing effect. And when it comes to Souma himself, Megumi practically idolizes him while Erina considers him to be low class and borderline trashy despite acknowledging his talents.
* FreakOut: Has a bit of a minor one when she discovers that Soma is the son of her idol, Jouichirou, and is unable to do anything but reminisce all the harsh things she said to Soma and realize that she has been insulting the ideals of someone she admired before passing out.
* FreudianExcuse: While part of it has to do with her genuine desire to emulate and please her idol, Jouichirou, much of Erina's obsession with culinary perfection is the result of [[spoiler:Azami's abusive parenting and training]].
* FriendlessBackground: There are two reasons for this. One, [[spoiler: Erina's father isolated her to prevent her from getting too close to anyone but him.]] Two, people intentionally kept their distance, viewing Erina as superior. The latter is the reason why Hisako always stood behind Erina, and why Alice left for Denmark to close the gap between their culinary skills. [[spoiler: Alice was asked to write letters to Erina to stay in touch, but Erina was never able to read any of the letters and write back to Alice, as Azami teared them apart before Erina was able to read them.]]
* GreenEyedMonster: During her first interaction with the Polaris residents, she confronts Soma about the fact that [[spoiler:Hisako seems to have become more friendly to him]].
* HairFlip: Tends to do this when she gets on her high horse.
* HairOfGoldHeartOfGold: While she can be stern and condescending, she's genuinely kind towards those closest to her, particularly Hisako, her best friend. [[spoiler:Post-HeelFaceTurn, she acts this way to the entire Polaris Dorm, going the extra mile to prepare them for the Regiment de Cuisine and doing her best to ensure their victory.]]
* HeroicBSOD:
** [[spoiler:Once Azami returns and announces his intent to return her to her "training," she flees to the Polaris dorm. While she gets along with everyone in the dorm, she also is shown to lose most of her defining personality characteristics and is often shown looking sad or even sitting alone in dark rooms. Eventually Soma snaps her out of it by trying to replicate Jouichirou's inventive cooking style.]]
** A more comical one occurs when [[spoiler:she finds out Soma is Jouichiro's son]]. She instantly remembers how badly she treated Soma and she goes blank for a few moments.
* HonoraryTrueCompanion: After taking shelter at the Polaris Dorm and getting to know all of them, even to appreciate Soma, Erina vows to make all of them pass the promotion exams and preserve the freedom in their cooking styles. She even makes the Aldini brothers and Ikumi join her lectures. The residents immediately embraced her with open arms once they were told about how her father treated her.
* {{Hypocrite}}: Erina rejects Soma's cooking partly because she deems his commoner-grade skills unbecoming of such an elite institution as Tootsuki. However, despite its fierce reputation, it seems as though instruction and even competition with "normal" dishes is actually quite common at Tootsuki. However, she is either unaware of or refuses to admit the fact that the origins of many of the dishes used throughout the story can be traced back to similar roots. At one point, she criticizes Soma for being unaware that the bento is becoming more popular worldwide, ignoring its origins as a simple low-class lunchbox. Such foods are actually something of a theme throughout the tournament assignments, which makes her specific criticism come off as either pettiness or ignorance.
* IceQueen: Erina loathes showing any emotion besides anger or disdain, yet quietly expresses jealousy to Alice for her ability to freely cry after losing to Soma, and only in Megumi's presence was she able to show her distress over Hisako's sudden absence. During the festival she's shown to have [[DefrostingIceQueen mellowed out]] at least a little, showing concern over the poor showing by Alice, Hayama, Kurokiba, Soma and Tadokoro (ostensibly because they were finalists of the Autumn Election) during the Full Moon Banquet and then backtracking when Tadokoro gets upset by her scolding.
* ImprobableAge: She's paid enormous consultation fees just to test new dishes by various restaurants, something she's been doing for years. She's also already a culinary celebrity at age fifteen. Taken even further later on when [[spoiler: after her Dad has been removed from his position, ''she succeeds him as the dean of the School.'']]
* InformedAbility: She is rarely shown to actually cook anything. The vast majority of her characterization focuses on her supernatural sense of taste and not her actual ability to cook. However, she's a member of the Elite Ten council and the few times her cooking is shown, people tend to gush over it. [[spoiler:She proves her pedigree when she crushes Momo Akanegakubo, the best patissier at Tootsuki, 3-0 in a Shokugeki of sweets after being inspired by Megumi's dorayaki in the latter's battle against Momo in the previous round.]]
** Twice during the training camp; she's shown to have beaten Soma to 50 plates (and long before him if she is just getting out of the bath just before he enters), and having the highest tally of buffet plates at over 400 (with a goal of 200).
** [[spoiler: She utterly crushes Eishi's and Rindō's dishes and surpasses Sōma's own dish on the final round of the Regiment dé Cuisine. While Azami vainly rejects Erina's dish, it triggers Azami's bestowal on a far greater scale than that of Eishi and Sōma.]]
* InsufferableGenius: Erina really ''is'' a great cook. She's just completely obnoxious to people she considers below her. Right after Soma gets done teasing her, he realizes that not only did she beat him to serving fifty meals, but she beat him by such a wide margin that she was completely finished cleaning up and leaving the bath by the time he was just getting to it. She is also able to tell you how long you overcooked your food ''to the second'' before going on a tirade on just how to make the food better ''while she is tearing down your shop for another one of her food labs!''
* {{Irony}}: [[spoiler: Initially she was contemptuous and disdainful of Sōma, expressing her sadistic intention of expelling him. After the Regiment de Cuisine, she requests Sōma to become the First Seat of the Elite Ten because he was the biggest contributer for the Rebel victory. Sōma accepts it.]]
* ItRunsInTheFamily: Azami, Erina and Senzaemon all seem to hold Jouichiro in especially high regard.
* JerkassHasAPoint: Erina's criticism of dishes she's served almost always comes off in a jerkass way, complete with absurd metaphors such as comparing a flawed dish's flavor as being similar to being in a mixed bath with a Western Lowland Gorilla. However, while she doesn't pull punches, she's completely accurate and only trying to help in her own way. For example, even when she's actively being antagonistic and telling Soma the various reasons he's going to fail out, she's actually making astute observations about some of the flaws of his cooking. For example, in the buffet challenge, she notes that he chose the worst possible dish -- which turns out to be true because it couldn't be left on the buffet but had to be served immediately. Later on, during the runoff to the Autumn Election semifinals, Soma gets Erina to try his dish and give him a critique. She says very little about the dish other than saying Soma completely failed to understand the point of the assignment. While Mitsuru thinks Erina's just being a jerk, Soma interprets her vague comment as a clue that there's a fundamental flaw in his approach.
* JerkassRealization: Several times. Early on, Soma explains that he benefited from the experience of failing. To her, it sounded like he wasn't taking things seriously enough when in reality he absolutely hates to lose. When she sees him combine two of his failures into a dish that scores him 93 points, she realizes that his previous failures only made him more determined to fix his prior mistakes, so he worked on them until they became a completed dish worthy of being served on a grand stage. A more dramatic moment occurs when Erina learns that Soma's father is none other than Jouichiro Saiba, the only chef she ever admired. The realization of how disdainful she had acted towards her idol's son, who has the exact same cooking method, sends her into a (comical) daze for days.
* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: At first, Erina is openly hostile to Soma (although he fails to recognize it) and is initially shown hoping he will be expelled or even actively trying to get him expelled. Erina is also shown to be completely merciless to those she deems unworthy of Totsuki or anyone who serves her a dish that's below her ridiculously high standards. On the other hand, once she warms up to people, she's very caring and mostly friendly, even if she is still stern and brutally honest about their cooking. She also won't tolerate abuse of power like [[spoiler:Azami becoming the headmaster of Tootsuki and expelling her friends]].
* TheLeader: To LaResistance formed by the Polaris Dorm. She even gets compared to Joan of Arc.
* LonelyRichKid: She doesn't have many friends, so when Hisako leaves her side out of shame after losing to Akira, she gets really depressed. [[spoiler:It didn't help that Azami blocked off all communication between her and Alice when they were kids while he was brainwashing/abusing her]].
* NeutralFemale: [[spoiler:Once Azami takes over Tootsuki, she's pretty much relegated to a sad wreck, which is justified because of her father's stranglehold on her psyche. She is completely unable to oppose him and it took Alice, Ryou and Hisako to remove her from her residence and get her to run away with them and, even then, she was on the verge of going back until she was taken in at the Polaris Dorm. Since then, she's more or less lingered in the background and ForcedToWatch. After being called out on this trope by Alice, and Souma's cooking reminding her of her lost passion for cooking, she starts actively helping the Polaris dorm take a stand against Central. She later gets better to the point that she flat-out tells him that she'll relinquish her seat.]]
* NoHeroToHisValet: Played with. Early on, Hisako ''does'' worship Erina and even somehow convinces herself that Erina being an immature sore loser is a mark of greatness, but when Souma convinces her to relax and just be Erina's friend, she openly admits to him that Erina was never the 'well behaved' girl she considered herself to be. She's immature, petty and a sore loser.
* NoSocialSkills: At one point, while complaining to Soma about his narrow-minded view of cooking, he completely ignores everything she has to say just to point out that she is really hard to talk to despite his own ability to get along with others. She doesn't have any friends, only an assistant that worships her and a cousin that likes making fun of her. [[spoiler:Her poor social skills are a result of Azami intentionally isolating her as a child to have more control over her, including destroying letters to and from Alice, the closest thing she had to a friend.]]
* NotAfraidOfYouAnymore: In Chapter 204, [[spoiler:when Azami threatens her one too many times, she leaves the Elite Ten]].
* NotSoAboveItAll: Despite being a prodigy in the Culinary World, Erina is far from being mature herself, as she loses her composure whenever Soma is mentioned, pouting, refusing to talk to him or even apply basic manners around him. [[spoiler: She's also not above doing something as childish as playing Rock, Paper, Scissors to decide a serious outcome.]]
* OddFriendship: Develops this with the entirety of the Polaris Dorm, she is even capable of having a completely civil and friendly conversation with Yukihira when she wants to. She gets particularly close to Megumi who even lampshades never thinking they could be friends before.
* OhCrap: Her reaction at the end of Chapter 131 when [[spoiler:Azami barges in on her stall at the final day of the Full Moon Banquet. Also, a comical one 20 chapters later when she learns that Jouichirou is Souma's dad]].
* {{Ojou}}: Beautiful, rich, arrogant, and worshipped by pretty much everyone (other than Soma and Alice). "[[UsefulNotes/JapaneseHonorifics Erina-sama]]" is very new to lower-class amenities like public pools or "casual dating" and doesn't even know how to shop for shoujo mangas by herself, leaving the "mundane" duties (like operating a standard household washing machine) to Hisako to do for her.
--> '''Erina''': Hisako, do you know how to operate a washing machine?\\
'''Hisako''': A washing machine? Well... Yes. Of course.\\
'''Erina''': Oh... That's amazing.
* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: It should tell you something about [[spoiler: her father]] when she's visibly terrified and submissive towards him.
* OptOut: She leaves the Elite Ten to [[spoiler:side with Soma and his friends in the Regiment de Cuisine]].
* OrcusOnHerThrone: At the start of the series, she relies on conniving and throwing well-known students loyal to her at Soma to try and get him expelled even though she probably could have simply challenged him to a Shokugeki and won herself. [[spoiler:She lampshades this trope during her battle with Momo, saying that she wasn't going to be the kind of queen who sits pretty on her throne after shedding her previously close-minded culinary ideology.]]
* OutOfFocus: For most of the first half of the series, she doesn't get much screen time despite being set up as a main character. Even her assistant Hisako gets more focused on than her for a while. Lampshaded in an omake during the Fall Classic arc where she's dismayed to learn she's not going to appear very much due to her duties on the Elite Ten Council (although she ends up showing up roughly as much as she did before and after). This changes once [[spoiler:her father appears]], which causes her backstory to come to light and sets her CharacterDevelopment in motion.
* ThePerfectionist: She considers the idea of any kind of failure or struggle abhorrent. The idea that Soma actually learns from failure even if he doesn't like it repulses her. To her, a true master can never fail. However, it's rather telling that she seems to look up to Jouichirou because she believes him to be similarly obsessed with victory, unaware of how different he is in real life.
* PetTheDog: At the end of their Stagiaire together, she gives Tadokoro a ride home, during which they have a relatively normal conversation. Although Tadokoro (who has an extreme fear of authority figures) is concerned that Erina will look down on her, it's shown that Erina respects Tadokoro's abilities and expresses confusion that someone of Tadokoro's talent had previously achieved so little in the academy. During the same conversation she's also shown to be quite lonely without Hisako due to the latter's departure after losing to Akira. Erina apparently doesn't mind that her friend lost, contrary to her normal perfectionist attitude.
* PickyEater: Erina's defining characteristic and her ultimate "weapon" in the cooking world, to the point she is famous even as a young child. Indeed, her first words when she was an infant were to ''criticize her mother's breast milk''. Comes with a RedBaron nickname, the "Divine Tongue." She is so demanding that potential Tootsuki applicants will skip the entrance exam rather than have her criticize them because of the risk her criticism will follow them. This becomes a source of despair because her sense of taste is so discerning that, as a young child, she began to realize that every dish she tried, even those labeled as "gourmet" were seriously flawed.
* {{Pride}}: She lives by pride and refuses to admit that she's wrong or ever back down from an opinion she arrived at without thinking. It's hinted that she doesn't really like being this way sometimes, envying Alice for her ability to openly express her frustration after losing to Soma at the Autumn Election quarterfinals. She can also be a bit of a sore loser and doesn't like to be seen getting worked up or upset.
* TheProudElite: Erina looks down on everyone she considers to have lower social status or cooking talent, which makes Soma the main target of her disdain. This is because of her family's name and her status as a member of the Council, which also gives her a reputation as unapproachable. Unknown to most, she secretly wants real friends (at the start of the series Hisako is her only friend, but the relationship is on less equal terms than Erina would actually like) and also does recognize talented people without being condescending (like giving proper praise to Tadokoro, ignoring her past bad grades).
* RaisedByGrandparents: Erina's father Azami has been absent for ten years and there's no mention of what happened to her mother. During that time, her grandfather Senzaemon was her only legal guardian.
* RapunzelHair: Her hair goes past her waist.
* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech:
** Erina tries to give one to Soma after he makes his BadassBoast at the opening ceremony. It turns into an InsultBackfire when Soma counters her claim that most applicants received gifted middle-school education by the fact that he essentially grew up in a kitchen. She tries to give him these speeches several more times, but they never have their intended effect.
** She also gives a minor one to [[spoiler:Azami]] after [[spoiler:she announces that she's leaving the Elite Ten]].
* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Even after she took over the management in ''Excellent'', she makes the head chef, who had a prejudice against students, listen to Megumi's suggestion, which turns to be a needed work improvement.
* RedBaron: Her nickname is the "Divine Tongue," due to her exceptionally refined palate.
* ReluctantFanserviceGirl: During the BeachEpisode, Erina's wearing a hoodie to cover the bikini Alice makes her wear to the pool. Outside of the "orgasmic eating" panels, Erina dresses properly in her school uniform. After she leaves the family manor, she wears a simple, demure dress. Goes from "reluctant" to "InnocentFanserviceGirl" once she gives a lecture to the Polaris students dressed in a HotTeacher's cosplay (for no real reason, as it's an informal study session).
* TheRival: Soma is determined to have a competition with her one day as well as make her admit that he makes good food. In turn, Erina is initially determined to crush Soma due to his perceived lack of respect (ironically, while he really did treat her with disrespect at their first meeting due in part to Erina's haughtiness, it's readily apparent that once he learns more about her he respects her abilities quite a bit). However, due to his affable nature, Soma isn't entirely aware of [[UnknownRival the degree to which Erina claims to dislike him]] and simply attributes her {{Jerkass}} behavior to Erina being hard to get along with. Even after she mellows out towards him, she still won't tell him anything he makes is good (which just makes him try harder).
-->'''Soma''': Wait for it. I'll make you clearly say "It's good" with that mouth of yours! I'll exhaust my cooking to its limits!
* RomanticTwoGirlFriendship: Many of her interactions with Hisako (particularly early in the series) can be seen like this, as Hisako gets excited with the prospect of tasting her cooking or worships everything Erina does. As the characters develop, its later shown to be a more traditional friendship, despite Hisako's continued hero worship of Erina and her family.
* RousingSpeech: [[spoiler: She officially makes her stand against her father's principles after tasting Soma's classic Yukihira food, inspiring the Polaris Dorm students to give the Promotion Exams their all, reminding them that their biggest quality is how free their cooking is.]]
* TheRunaway: [[spoiler:In Chapter 137, Alice managed to convince her to run away from her father.]]
* SacrificedBasicSkillForAwesomeTraining: Despite her talent, Erina has little in the way of social skills. Having never taken the time to enjoy her youth (Alice had to coax her to go to a public pool, a place she's never set foot in; case in point, she complains it doesn't have hair dryers), she also finds the concept of romance beneath her, which Alice calls her out on, considering she's now in high school.
* SchoolIdol: She has the biggest following over most of the school and has many admirers, both male and female (despite the fact they are all too intimidated to act on it) and she's currently the most talented of the freshmen.
* ScrewTheRulesImDoingWhatsRight: When Azami attempts to persuade her to [[spoiler:join him in fighting against Soma]], she objects and tells him that [[spoiler:she's resigning from the Elite Ten]].
* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: A heroic example. In chapter 204, Azami attempts to convince Erina to [[spoiler:join his side against her friends]]. But Erina flat-out tells her father that, [[spoiler:after enduring enough of his abuse, she's ditching the Elite Ten to side with her friends]].
* ShelteredAristocrat: She doesn't know how to shop for shoujo manga on her own, so she exchanges a consulting gig (worth a lot of money) with Soma for some volumes. She also finds the washing machine mysterious and amazing. This is also lampshaded by Alice several times, which comes off as comically hypocritical due to the fact the trope applies to Alice just as much as Erina, but Alice is oblivious of it.
* ShutUpHannibal: In chapter 204, she [[spoiler:flat-out tells Azami that she'll relinquish the Tenth Seat when the latter threatens her one too many times]].
* SoreLoser: Her pride keeps her from admitting that food of humble origins could possibly meet her high standards, having lived off the most expensive and elegant foods in the world her entire life. During Soma's entrance examination, she stated multiple times that his food was beneath her and could in no way satisfy her palate. When it does, she gives out an obvious lie rather than admit that she was wrong. Of course, Soma taunting her the entire time probably didn't help her mood either.
* TheStarscream: A heroic example. She does this to Azami when [[spoiler:she resigns from the Elite Ten and helps the Rebels win the Regiment de Cuisine]].
* TheStrategist: [[spoiler:After fully defecting to the side of the Polaris Dorm, she lays out the battle plans for the Regiment de Cuisine in order to maximize the heroes' chance of success against Central, giving everyone extra classes on the fine points of cooking in order to capitalize on their strengths and cover their weaknesses.]]
* TalksLikeASimile: Her judging of food tends to skew towards very abstract and colorful comparisons.
* ToBeLawfulOrGood: Technically, obeying [[spoiler:Azami]] is the "lawful" choice, but not the "good" one. Being a elite but moral student, Erina faces this dilemma when [[spoiler:Azami returns]]. She chooses the side of "good" when [[spoiler:Azami goes too far]].
* TookALevelInKindness: When Soma [[spoiler:manages to convince her that her way of thinking about cooking is too narrow and that greatness doesn't have to come from obsessive perfectionism,]] she mellows out a great deal, stands up, takes charge and spends a week tutoring the Polaris students so that they won't fail out during the Promotion Exams. She even drags Soma into her lessons and states that she doesn't want him to fail out despite his taunts about her changed attitude.
* TrainingFromHell: She underwent one as a child [[spoiler:by Azami to cultivate her already incredibly refined palate.]]
* TraumaButton: [[spoiler:Azami's return to Tootsuki]] causes her to freeze in shock.
* TrueArtIsIncomprehensible: InUniverse. Early on, her criticism of dishes is coached in bizarre metaphor:
--> '''Erina''': It tasted as if I were trying to enjoy a hot spring bath while a western lowland gorilla stared at me!\\
'''One cook''': Her sense of taste is completely different from us common mortals.\\
'''Another''': What does that even mean?!
* {{Tsundere}}: Alice is one of her best friends, but they usually squabble, bicker and taunt each other when they're together because neither one wants to admit that they actually like each other. She has a lot of pride in general, which keeps her openly expressing a lot of her emotions apart from disdain or anger. [[spoiler:After the events of chapter 172 she becomes a Tsundere type B towards Soma, quite clear after she made a "I believe in you" speech sound like a mild threat, going so far as to rush to his side to find out if he passed his third exams. She doesn't seem to mind if people know she cares about her friends, but dislikes being seen getting emotional about it.]]
* {{Tykebomb}}: Trained from an early age to cultivate her obvious gifts in taste sense. [[spoiler:This takes a darker turn later on when its shown that much of this training by her father was a forcible attempt to brainwash her into parroting his elitist culinary philosophy.]]
* UsedToBeASweetKid: While Erina is still compassionate and willing to help others, she showed it more often when she was younger. [[spoiler:Her abusive father hardened her, unfortunately]].
* VitriolicBestBuds: Alice and Erina butt heads frequently, but they get along quite well, which other people seem to notice. They seem to have been friendlier when they were children, but still fought quite a bit.
* WellDoneDaughterGirl: Erina has always admired Soma's father, Jouichirou Saiba, ever since he cooked for her delicious and original meals she had never seen before. He's the role model that she continues trying to impress, in contrast to the chilly relationship she has with her biological father.
* WellExcuseMePrincess: Soma and Erina's dynamic. Erina expects to intimidate Soma and treats him like a "commoner," but he never notices her disdain or even returns fire with taunts of his own. As a result, their typical interaction is Erina giving him TheReasonYouSuckSpeech and Soma failing to notice her contempt and retorting with a boast of his own about how he plans to beat her.
* WhenSheSmiles:
** When she opens the door of her house thinking Hisako has returned, she attends with a wide and cheerful smile, only to discover it was her arch-nemesis Soma and Mitsuru, who quickly gets a picture of her face, much to her embarrassment.
** [[spoiler:During the judging of the red-white battles, Erina tries to deny a compliment, only to become flustered when Soma and co. reassure her that she did a good job, noting how happy she looked while cooking]].
* ZettaiRyouiki: Grade A. Her stockings are Tight High and black, unlike the other students who wear Grade D white socks. She may very well be on the way to a Grade S if her {{Tsundere}} tendencies are any indication.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Etsuya Eizan]]
[[quoteright:225:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/shokugeki_etsuya.jpg]]
->'''Voiced by:''' Creator/TomokazuSugita (Japanese), Anthony Hunter (English)

Ninth Seat of the Elite Ten and a 91st Generation (2nd year) student, he's a selfish, arrogant teen with little regard for others beyond ways of making him get money. With his incredible business savvy when it comes to the culinary industry, he serves as a business consultant for many famous restaurants, food chains, produce distributors and the like, despite his age. His culinary style revolves around utilizing flavors and techniques that effectively negate the flavors of other dishes so his own stands out more.

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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Soumei Saitou]]
[[quoteright:226:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/2d67095a63b45b92cf74890fbef4bb03.png]]

->'''Voiced by:''' Creator/KatsuyukiKonishi

Fifth seat of the Elite Ten and a 90th Generation (3rd year) student, who was first introduced in the Autumn Leaf viewing event. He's an avid practitioner of the ways of bushido and his culinary specialty is sushi.

----
* AffablyEvil: Saitou is one of the least antagonistic members of Central, going so far as to praise Subaru's ability to imitate his sushi skills as well as he can. That said, Saitou is still working for Central, an organization that amounts to a cult that forces everyone to conform to its culinary standards through extortion, violence, and brainwashing.
* AlliterativeName: His first and last name both begin with the letter "S".
* AntiquatedLinguistics: He speaks in a very archaic manner. In order to give viewers a better understanding, English translations of the manga have him using words such as "art", "doth", "trite", "hath", "hast", "thy", "thee" and "thou". When Mimasaka traces him and starts doing the same Soumei tries to deny that he acts like that, only for the other third years to tell him he does.
* ArrogantKungFuGuy: Surprisingly averted compared to other members of the new Elite Ten like Momo or Shiratsu. He's much more down to earth than his compatriots and even offers Subaru advice on what he did wrong after he's confused why his Perfect Trace didn't net him a win.
* BadassBoast: Has a habit of dropping these after adopting Bushido into his life around age 15.
--> '''Soumei:''' "Carving his way through tumultuous times is a warrior's honor! I'll turn this world upside down!"
* CatchPhrase: "Feast to thy heart's desire."
* {{Chuunibyou}}: Given his humble background, he's simply a normal dude trying to act like a samurai to appear as a cool guy for no good reason.
* CombatCompliment: He mentions multiple times that Mimasaka's Perfect Trace is a magnificent skill to have and [[spoiler:even when he defeats him anyway due to a difference of experience, Saitou doesn't brag and says Mimasaka did all he could, thus he is not to blame]].
* CoolSword: Carries a large sword with him that he uses in his sushi preparations, mainly because it ensures a supremely sharp edge that is perfect for slicing.
* CripplingOverspecialization: ''Completely and utterly subverted''. The idea that he would be limited in his abilities due to specializing in sushi is shown to be utterly ridiculous, as his mastery over sushi gives him an extensive and powerful ability to highlight his star ingredients through the use of flavor enhancers such as vinegar, butter, oil and starters. Even Soma seems somewhat rattled by how effectively he manages to integrate an ingredient like butter into a ''seafood don''.
* DarkAndTroubledPast: His mother got an apprenticeship at Shiragami Sushi, but she was overworked with menial tasks because of their sexism. After she fell ill, Soumei took over the family restaurant and challenged Shiragami and other sushi restaurants with the intent of turning the sushi world upside-down.
* DelinquentHair: After his mother fell ill, he changed his haircut to a mohawk.
* DuelingScar: He has a horizontal scar across the bridge of his nose.
* EvenBadMenLoveTheirMamas: His flashback in Chapter 241 shows that he and his mother ran a small sushi restaurant together. After his mother gained an apprenticeship at an artisan sushi restaurant however, the artisans proved to be enormously sexist and in a cruel inversion of StayInTheKitchen made her do menial tasks until her body broke down because of their sexism. After that day, Soumei made a point to cut down ''anyone and everyone'' who insulted him and his mother's restaurant with his cooking.
* EverythingsBetterWithSamurai: English translations of his dialogue are extremely antiquated and he strictly follows the code of bushido, never looking down upon his foes and always seeking a fair battle. His skill with his sushi knife is compared to [[IaijutsuPractitioner Iaijutsu]], with those defeated by him falling as if cut down with a single stroke.
* EvilCounterpart: To Soma. Both have scars in their faces and were raised by one parent running a humble restaurant and even their names sound similar. Unlike Soma who rejects Central's philosophy outright, Soumei adopted the principles of Central in hopes to take revenge on the sushi fundamentalists who overworked his mom until she fell ill by making his standard of sushi what the entire culinary industry of Japan will have to adopt under Central.
* EyesAlwaysShut: It's not until Chapter 219 when he finally opens just one eye, after he's amused by Mimasaka imitating him before their match.
* GracefulLoser: [[spoiler: Even more so than Nene. When Soma turns out to be more of a challenge than he anticipated, Soumei's response is [[WorthyOpponent to ask how he became so strong]] ''while smiling''. Then when Soma eventually wins the competition with a unanimous vote of 3-0, Soumei simply smiles and admits that he lost]].
* HonorBeforeReason: Soumei is so passionate about the ways of bushido that he'll behave like an honorable samurai at any moment. This includes helping out his opponents during a match to make things fair, as seen in Chapter 225 when he offers his sword to Mimasaka to aid in the latter's Perfect Trace. His fellow elites tend to find this either amusing or annoying.
* ICallItVera: He named his sword Isanakiri.
* ProverbialWisdom: Spouts off a proverb after Takumi beats Eizan.
* RankUp: [[spoiler:As of the Regiment de Cuisine, Saitou now holds the Fourth Seat.]]
* RedBaron: Urara aptly calls him "The Last Samurai of the Showa Era" upon announcing his match-up against Soma.
* TokenGoodTeammate: As good as one can be while supporting Azami's regime. He has the least selfish reason for joining Central (excluding [[spoiler:Akira]], who was basically forced to join them) and is the most polite and respectful towards the rebels.
* {{Samurai}}: Soumei lives by the code of the bushido and incorporates it into his mannerisms.
* WaterWakeup: He splashes cold water on himself in order to stave off fatigue before his next match with Soma. It is a parody of ritual purification, called misogi in Japanese.
* WellIntentionedExtremist: Soumei's goal is borderline ''noble'' -- fitting for his samurai motif. While it is partially motivated by revenge, it is also motivated by a genuine desire to end discrimination in the workplace, discrimination not just his mother but others have suffered as well, and continue to do so everyday. Soumei even presents it as "protecting the weak". Unfortunately, he thinks the best way to achieve his goal is by supporting Central's ideology and allowing only a select few the right to flourish with their own cooking styles. [[spoiler:After facing Soma, however, who manages to beat him by using all the techniques he learned from his friends and fellow students over the course of his tenure at Tootsuki, all of whom can be regarded as "weaker" chefs, he realizes how wrong his approach was]].
* WorthyOpponent: [[spoiler:Soma manages to earn his respect during their match, to the point that when Soumei loses, he warns Soma about Eishi's strength and wishes him good luck in his next bout]].
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Momo Akanegakubo]]

[[quoteright:225:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/0a38e2ebd0870cccbd40201db743a161.png]]
->'''Voiced by:''' Creator/RieKugimiya

Fourth seat of the Elite Ten and a 90th Generation (3rd year) student who was first introduced in the Autumn Leaf viewing event, whose cute looks and childish behavior mask a high level of arrogance and the skill to match it. Her specialty is in desserts, particularly cakes and western confections, and she is currently Tootsuki's best pastry chef.

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* BadassAdorable: She's tiny, tends to look like she's in need of a nap, and carries a big plushie with her everywhere she goes, but she's still the fourth best student in the entire school. Sales and ability are noted to be only vaguely correlated, but she does outsell everyone in the most expensive area during the Full Moon Banquet Festival, where most of the other Elite Ten had put their stands, something that she wastes no time in pointing out when she first speaks during the story. Chapter 153 states that she's the best pastry chef at Tootsuki, meaning that it's highly likely that not even those above her in the Elite 10 could defeat her in a dessert battle, and that she has managed to get to her position as 4th in the Elite 10 on the strength of her pastry skills alone.
* BerserkButton: Don't ever mess with her desserts or call Bucchi a stuffed toy.
* BitchInSheepsClothing: In Chapter 229, unlike her previous behavior, Momo is quite talkative and friendly towards the Rebels, even giving them nicknames. However, Satoshi knows well that she only does that to people she looks down on, which includes the Elite 10 members with seats lower than hers.
* CharacterTic: She always tears off her plushie's paws to use as mittens while she bakes. She also tends to pinch, squeeze or bite said plushie if she gets angry or annoyed.
* CompanionCube: She is always carrying her cat plushie "Bucchi".
* CutenessProximity: Momo loves all things cute. The very reason she decided to become a pâtissier is because she finds desserts to be the cutest food of all.
** Chapter 245 showcases that she's basically been a prodigy in the realm of cuteness ever since she was a little girl, as her wealthy parents would buy her gifts that she'd choose herself, and anything she'd choose would inevitably become a very trendy and famous item further down the road, showcasing Momo's knack for always knowing the cute things that would become a big hit. As such and very much like Erina, she became a renowned consultant for businesses since a very young age, letting companies know what the cutest items were amongst a variety of things such as plush toys, clothing, artwork, and of course, desserts.
* TheDreaded: At the very least Eizan thinks so, as after mouthing off to her in a very crass way, she just glares at him and doesn't even need to raise her voice to intimidate Eizan into talking to her respectfully and complying with her (admittedly childish) requests.
* EveryoneHasStandards: She finds it distasteful when some Central soldiers openly mock their opponents.
* FlatCharacter: Momo likes sweets. Momo doesn't like people. Unlike the rest of the Elite Ten that are generally fleshed out, she only has these two traits to define her.
** Finally starts getting averted starting on chapter 245, where we see some of her backstory. She essentially grew up similar to Erina in terms of becoming a famous and highly sought after consultant, but unlike Erina's consulting being poisoned by her manipulative and abusive father, Momo basically grew up spoiled, which helps explains her current personality.
* {{Foil}}: To Erina. With Momo being exactly like Erina pre-character development which Erina admits to. They are both prodigies due to an innate talent of theirs, Erina's God Tongue and Momo's cuteness sense, and have been consultants since childhood. They were both [[{{Jerkass}} jerks]] that refuses to accept different ways of thinking about their skill set(cooking for Erina, cuteness for Momo) and looked down on everyone. But Erina grew out of this mindset due her experiences with Polar Star Dorm becoming much kinder and much more open to alternative ways of thinking as a result.
* GirlsLoveStuffedAnimals: Her plushie Bucchi.
* HypocriticalHumor: She often bites and tugs Bucchi to relieve stress, and tears off its paws to use as cooking mittens, yet she throws a fit when Saito stores the [=IDs=] of [[spoiler:the students who failed the promotion exams and facing expulsion]] in its back, where it actually has a pouch and doesn't involve damaging it.
* {{Jerkass}}: The very first words out of her mouth is her calling students who aren't a part of the Elite 10 "lowlifes" and how she doesn't want to deal with them in Shokugekis because they've "lost by default". Much later on we see how she's very condescending towards those she considers to be below her, but masks it under an act of cutesy behavior.
* TheNicknamer: Momo likes giving cutesy nicknames to people by shortening their first name and adding the word "myan" to it, with the exception of Souma, whom she shortens his family name and adds "hyan" to it, so as to not have to call Souma and Soumei by the same nickname. As stated above, though, she only does this to people she looks down on. [[spoiler: The fact that she stops using a nickname for Megumi after their battle is evidence that despite beating her, she acknowledges her skill as a chef.]]
* NotGoodWithPeople: From her introduction, the only one she always interacts with normally is her plush toy "Bucchi", despite it being an object and not a person. Apparently, it can take a month for her to have normal conversations with people or even make eye contact with them, prompting Soma to wonder just how she ever managed to get through the training camp and other events (such as the Stagiaire period). Though it's stated later in Chapter 229, that once Momo gets used to being around others, she can be quite talkative.
* OlderThanTheyLook: She is small, has her hair like cat ears and carries a plushie toy with her, and despite this she's one of the oldest members of the current Elite Ten.
* PerpetualFrowner: Her expressions are almost always either neutral, bored or annoyed, though it can change depending on the situation, but she has never been seen smiling at all. It's not until chapter 238 that she finally smiles when she shows off her dessert to the judges.
* TheProudElite: She considers the Shokugekis against people out of the Elite Ten to be a waste of time, since they are all "lowlifes" to her.
* RankUp: [[spoiler:As of the Regiment de Cuisine, she now holds the Third Seat.]]
* SilkHidingSteel: She looks and acts like a little emotionless girl, but the judges note that her talent and refinement in pastry and confectionary granted her the 4th Seat of the Council.
* SomethingAboutARose: Her first dish in the Regiment de Cuisine is a tart made with apple and petals from the damask rose, which is renowned for its elegant fragrance. Her presentation has all of her pastries in the shape of a rose while serving them in a basket made of bread.
* SweetTooth: Her specialty relies on sweets, confectioneries and cakes.
* TeensAreShort: The shortest member of the Elite Ten.
* ThirdPersonPerson: Does this at times, perhaps as an attempt to sound as adorable as she looks.
* TokenMiniMoe: She's the smallest of the Elite Ten, if not the entire student body, and deliberately designed to be the adorable one of the group.
* TranquilFury: Even at her angriest, she doesn't throw tantrums, make a huge scene or raises her voice, always going forth with full concentration on her sweets. At the most she'll just glare and do a bit of trash talking but always in a calm manner.
* VillainousBSOD: After her win against Megumi. The fact that the other girl, a first year who at one point was in danger of being expelled due to bad grades, came so close to beating her clearly shook Momo up. This drove her to take her next opponent with a level of seriousness and drive that no one else has ever seen from her.
* WeaponOfChoice: Surprisingly, Bucchi is both her pet-toy and also one of her bakery utensils, as she uses his paws as mittens.
* WhyDidItHaveToBeSnakes: Or in her case, planes, which absolutely terrify her.
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Tosuke Megishima]]
[[quoteright:225:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/c3117c5e8f8a8a1fa94e81fb3891e157.png]]

Third seat of the Elite Ten and a 90th Generation (3rd year) student, who was first introduced in the Autumn Leaf viewing event. He's a stoic but fair man, who specializes in Ramen, and unlike most of Totsuki's student body, he's not keen on the competitive nature of things at school.
----
* HundredPercentAdorationRating: Due to his tendency to travel everywhere and helping shops in the area, every ramen chef in Japan loves him.
* AchievementsInIgnorance: He wasn't even ''trying'' to get into the Elite Ten. He just kept winning match after match until he reached the third seat. In his conversation with Soma and Megumi, there's even a flashback of him being confused when his fellow classmates throw him a congratulations party.
* TheBigGuy: He's the tallest, biggest member of the Elite Ten, and one of the biggest students seen thus far. He easily towers over the other Elite Ten, and has the cooking skills to match his formidable stature.
* CoolHat: Wears a chullo with a bobble on it.
* CurbStompBattle:
** [[spoiler: Off-screen one where he outright defeats Shoko the new 5th Seat without even breaking a sweat. His victory gives Team Rebel Alliance's a whooping 3-0 victory over the Elite Ten, in the 1st Bout at least]].
** [[spoiler:Soma challenged him several times in order to get him to join their Regimen de Cuisine against Central, but couldn't win a single match.]]
* ForHappiness: He sees no real point in cooking competitions, instead wishing to making customers happier.
* HeroicBuild: He looks more akin to an enormous bodybuilder or a heavyweight boxer than a ramen chef, of all things.
* MartialPacifist: He has no interest in battles, though [[LetsGetDangerous he will fight if necessary]].
* RuleOfThree: Is the third seat and also the third highest amount of sales from first to last day of the Moon Banquet Festival.
* SacrificialLion: [[spoiler: We knew Rindou was strong, but he's the still 3rd strongest member of the Elite Ten who invents a completely new type of Ramen in order to try and defeat her and [[LetsGetDangerous this was when he was serious]], and gets destroyed 3-0 anyway. Shows how much of a difference there is between even the 2nd and 3rd seats.]]
* SixthRanger: [[spoiler:Joins the remaining rebels in their Team Shokugeki against Central]].
* TheStoic: He always has a serious and downright bored look on his face.
* StraightMan: To pretty much everyone in the Regimen de Cuisine, while everyone else has their own quirks and silly personalities, Megishima questions what they're doing in silence and remaining ever serious.
* WhiteSheep: The only one of the unknown elite ten who didn't vote in Azami. [[spoiler:Azami kicks him out of the group in return.]]
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Rindou Kobayashi]]
[[quoteright:225:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/3c33af0fadf6b47d57592b4afde4d587.png]]
->'''Voiced by:''' Creator/ShizukaIto

The Second seat of the Elite Ten and a 90th Generation (3rd year) student, who was first introduced in the Autumn Leaf viewing event. She's a jovial, friendly girl with a big appetite, a desire to try all dishes she can get her hands on, and has developed an interest in Souma and his skills. Her culinary specialty is a focus on the use of rare and exotic ingredients.
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* AnimalEyes: Has yellow eyes with slitted pupils to enhance her animal motif.
* AnimalMotifs: Her character motif is a cat. She has yellow feline eyes, CuteLittleFangs, a mischievous nature and is frequently shown in cat-like poses. [[spoiler: However, it also doubles as an Alligator motif when she gets more serious and isn't portrayed cutely. When Takumi noticed her hidden panic during their Shokugeki in Chapter 252 she was represented by a roaring Alligator.]]
* BerserkButton: Interrupting, highjacking, or just plain messing with a culinary battle she's taking part in, as showcased in Chapter 251.
* BigEater: She wants to taste everyone's food and judge it for herself, which is reasonable enough, but during the Full Moon Banquet she doesn't even bother to set up a stand because she's too busy visiting ''every booth available'' -- that is, all 120 stalls in five days.
* BlindingBangs: Her left eye is always covered by her hair.
* BrilliantButLazy: Set up as a LazyBum at first, but she's the second seat of the Elite Ten. Also, her specialty is [[spoiler:rare ingredients, like the Alligator she uses in her match with Megishima]] and she's not too lazy to [[spoiler:travel the world looking for new tastes, a lá Jouichirou.]]
* BrutalHonesty: When Soma tells her his entire plan (of taking over on the fourth day and hope to sell more on the last day), Rindou immediately tells him that it was very unrealistic and he would still be behind Kuga's booth on general sales. Then she directly tells Eishi that he is bothering them by asking a lot of unnecessary questions and he should just focus on doing what he does best. She also casually comments out loud on what an underhanded schemer Eizan is, and (accidentally) insults him for losing to Soma in a Shokugeki, which annoys him greatly.
* CatSmile: Does this whenever she does something [[http://www.mangapanda.com/shokugeki-no-soma/192/12 mischievous]] or she is amused by something that she hears, so basically all of the time.
* CloudcuckooLander: Snuck out of class in middle school to watch swallows, orders Eishi around and generally just does whatever she wants at the time without thinking.
* CoolBigSis:
** She acts like this for other students who she finds interesting, mostly Soma and Kuga. When she heard that Kuga had been beaten in sales by Soma on the fourth day of the Full Moon Banquet, she immediately rushed to his stand to tease him. Megumi described their interactions as a pair of siblings.
** She's quite friendly and jovial towards Soma and Megumi, inviting them (an omake showed she also invited Subaru but he declined) to eat at Eishi's booth with her taking care of the bill, and she even extorted extra goodies from Eishi to give to them as take-away gifts.
** It's also been shown that she's very supportive of her Elite 10 compatriots in general, not only being against Satoshi, Terunori and Tosuke being kicked out of the Elite 10, but during the Regiment de Cuisine, she's the only Elite 10 member who shows support for and roots for her teammates.
* CuteLittleFangs: As part of her cat motif, she's always drawn with these. However, they're only really cute when she's drawn in a goofy style. When drawn more realistically or threateningly they're much more prominent and outright dangerous looking.
* EnigmaticMinion: Without her critical vote, Azami could not have taken over Tootsuki. However, ever since then she's done next to nothing to actually support his goals and behaved quite neutrally at worst. [[spoiler:As a result of going easy on the rebels by letting them pass a test they were supposed to fail, she's later removed from her position of examiner during the promotion exams. It's only on the Regiment de Cuisine that she finally seems to be making an effort to support Central. She also only voted for Azami because of Tsukasa and several characters have noticed that she's uncomfortable around or afraid of Azami during the Regiment de Cuisine, implying she's not there or supporting him by choice.]]
* ExtremeOmnivore: She specializes in the use of rare ingredients, even using her resources as 2nd Seat to travel all over the world and taste things she could find nowhere else but their place of origin. As such, Rindou will never hesitate to eat anything and everything.
* FirstNameBasis: She doesn't mind being called by her given name, but don't you dare use the wrong [[UsefulNotes/JapaneseHonorifics honorific]]. If she's your senpai, address her that way.
* GenkiGirl: She's incredibly friendly, curious and energetic.
* TheGadfly: Pretty much every time she appears she's trying to get a rise out of other people she finds amusing or interesting. Indeed, her first significant appearance after her introduction is her hanging around Terunori and Soma's stalls at the Full Moon Banquest festival just to tease them. She later shows up out of nowhere during a crucial shokugeki just to bother the participants (having dumped all of her work on [[ExtremeDoormat Eishi]] to do so).
* HeadlockOfDominance: PlayedForLaughs, since Rindou uses it to scold Eizan.
* HiddenDepths: Under her outward confidence and snarkiness, Takumi detected some nervousness and fear during their match. When asked about it, she promptly stomped off.
* HypocriticalHumor:
** She goes to scold Eizan for leaving all his pending paperwork to her. Except the reason she's even there to scold Eizan is because she dumped all of her work on Eishi.
** Later, she calls out Tsukasa for being inconsiderate when the latter expresses concern over Eizan's loss against a first year. She then went on to say the exact same thing in a much more inconsiderate manner.
* ItAmusedMe: Her stated motivation for voting to change the Tootsuki administration. She doesn't seem to have any particular affection for the cause, but she finds it more "interesting."
* KnifeNut: She has quite the collection of knives and her skills with them are second to none.
* LazyBum: Out of the whole Council, she's the only one who doesn't participate in running the Full Moon Banquet. Instead, she spends the entire festival eating at booths and arguing that it's a form of participation. She also goes out of her way to avoid doing her assigned work and dumps it on Eishi while she goes off to bother people. She averts it when it comes to food, though, as she'll flat-out travel the world and go on expeditions to find rare ingredients.
* MsFanservice: In some panels she is drawn wearing a barbarian style bikini. In chapter 262, [[spoiler:when Azami's blessing goes haywire, she is shown in her underwear.]]
* MythicalMotifs: When not goofing around she's drawn more seriously and looks like a vampire with a pair of rather sharp fangs and slitted eyes to match her beautiful appearance. Her predatory personality only enhances the image.
* OddFriendship: With Eishi. While he is shy, insecure and a control freak, Rindou actually respects him a lot, even if she doesn't seem to show it. She decided back in middle school that while Tsukasa could be the first seat, she'd take the second seat to support him.
* PeekABangs: Her bangs cover the left side of her face.
* SlasherSmile: She delivers a truly epic one in chapter 219 once she gets ready to start cooking. Combined with an intense look in her eyes, the knife on her hand and her CuteLittleFangs, she looks like a mix of vampire and villain of a slasher film.
* StatuesqueStunner: She is the tallest of the girls in the Elite Ten and OneHeadTaller than Terunori. Among the Elite 10, she and Eishi seem to have the most fans cheering over them.
* SweaterGirl: Always seen wearing a sweater.
* {{Troll}}: When Erina and Soma learn that [[spoiler: most of their friends failed the third Promotion Exam against the Elite Ten and got expelled, Rindou scares Erina even more by telling her that their remaining friends, Takumi and Megumi, had to face ''her''... only to reveal that she didn't actually have a cooking showdown with them and just demanded a decent dish to pass.]]
* UndyingLoyalty: To her best friend Eishi. Rindou's motivation for becoming the Second Seat was to support Eishi, who wanted to be the First Seat. [[spoiler:This loyalty is also heavily implied to be the ''real'' reason Rindou voted Azami in as headmaster, as Azami had managed to ingratiate himself to Eishi enough to make it happen]].
* VillainousFriendship: She and Eishi have been close friends since the first year of middle school, where they resolved to become #1 and #2 of Tootsuki (Rindou insisting on 2 since she knew there could only be one #1 and Tsukasa would try for it much harder than herself).
* WildCard: She seems to be motivated primarily by what's most amusing and voted in Azami because he thought things would be more interesting that way. However, she displays no malice or desire to expel those who don't support Central and is shown getting angry at the more underhanded methods used by Azami's followers, such as [[spoiler:Eizan's cheating]] or Azami [[spoiler:kicking out noncompliant Elite Ten members.]] Further, during the promotion exam, [[spoiler:she simply requires Takumi and Megumi to make her say their cooking was good, which is much more along the lines of a fair test than every other rebel was given. As a result, she was forbidden from taking part at the next examinations. On the other hand, she went all out fighting for the Central in the second bout of the Regiment de Cuisine, then excitedly calls for Eishi to crush the remaining opposition together with her in the next sweep, also, during her bout with Takumi, he noticed that she was afraid of something. And when he asked her about it, she stormed off in a huff]].
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[[/folder]]

[[folder:Eishi Tsukasa]]
->'''Voiced by:''' Creator/AkiraIshida
[[quoteright:225:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/7eeb91adb4fbe5bc750b5e70a1741ab1.png]]

First seat of the Elite Ten and a 90th Generation (3rd year) student, who was first introduced in the Autumn Leaf viewing event. He is noted to be very different from the other former First Seats introduced so far, lacking the confidence and charisma that Gin and Shinomiya present. While his specialty is French cuisine, his cooking is thoroughly based on the idea of removing all traces of "himself" from his dish and highlighting the good parts of every ingredient, thus paradoxically expressing himself.
----
* TheAce: He used to be the First Seat of the Elite Ten, which means that he was the best student of his generation at Tootsuki [[spoiler: until he was succeeded by Sōma]]. He's so confident in his skills that Soma and Megumi noted that, even when he's nervous, ''not once'' did he ask if his food was good.
** What is more impressive is that Eishi became the First Seat when he was still in his second year, just like Azami Nakiri. [[spoiler: Although Sōma became the First Seat just before entering his second year.]]
* {{Adorkable}}: Despite his good looks, tremendous cooking skill and superior social status as the First Seat, his personality is opposite of what most characters expect. He's easily flustered, shy and freaks out over all sorts of real or imagined problems.
* AmbiguousDisorder: His social awkwardness, mood swings, emotional detachment, and genius are all signs of some type of personality disorder. It really doesn't seem to occur to him to consider what anyone else needs, only focusing on developing his own cooking.
* BewareTheSillyOnes: He's a nervous wreck, constantly fretting over getting everything exactly right and is terrible at standing in front of other people, leading Rindou to walk all over him most of the time. However, not only is he the best student chef at Tootsuki, but his shy personality only masks an incredible level of arrogance and self centered behavior.
* {{Bishonen}}: Tall, slim and very pretty, and was labelled as "the handsome guy" before his name was revealed. When he shows up to lead a class, unnamed girls are shown freaking out about his appearance.
* BitchInSheepsClothing: He's genuinely timid and willing to humor his underclassmen, but beneath that Souma realizes that all he cares about is his own cooking. It never seems to occur to him to question whether his plans will help or hurt other people and, like the rest of Central, he's very willing to force everyone else to do things the way he wants.
* BrutalHonesty: When he tries to recruit Soma to be a sous chef, he point blank tells him that he has no interest in Soma's cooking and is only interested in using Soma's skills to improve his own cooking.
* ButForMeItWasTuesday: While Kuga was deeply affected by his loss to Eishi, the latter completely forgot ''his name'', let alone the actual match after only a week.
* ChildhoodFriend: To Rindou, having met her in middle school and being subsequently dragged along everywhere she went.
* CoatOverTheShoulder: He usually carries his uniform coat this way, and even his tie is over his shoulder as well.
* ColorMotifs: He is associated with White not only because of his clothes and hair, but because it also associates to his cooking style, since he removes his personality entirely to showcase the ingredients, also neutralizing himself from his work.
* TheComicallySerious: He first appeared collected, cool and cold, [[MoodWhiplash but then turns gloomy, complaining about all the hard work he has to do as the First Seat]], especially after Soma, Takumi and Subaru turned their Autumn Election matches into Shokugekis. All this, of course, is said without any trace of sarcasm.
* ControlFreak:
** His Full Moon Banquet stall only has three tables because Tsukasa can't trust anyone else with his cooking. Rather than having assistants and sous chefs to improve his kitchen's efficiency and allow him to serve a larger number of customers, Tsukasa insists on being in control of every part of every course of his cooking, from beginning to end. He even begs his servers not to jostle the plating as they bring the food to the table.
** Later, the way he insists on Anne on eating his first dish in the Regiment de Cuisine in a specific way despite the deliciousness of it already completely overwhelming her has... [[DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything slightly odd implications]].
* CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: He's quite submissive and shy, unusually so for a First Seat. That said, he definitely proves he's a culinary genius when he [[spoiler:crushes Terunori, 5-0, after the latter challenged him to a Shokugeki last year]]. Also, while his Full Moon Banquet stall isn't on the top of the uptown sales standings (considering he only has three tables), Soma and Megumi realize that his food is beyond high quality.
* CurbStompBattle: From what we have seen so far, every single Shokugeki he's ever been in has been this. He first really gets to show off when challenging Soma, coming up with a venison dish on the spot that completely crushes Soma's, even while Soma technically cheats by diverting from the skill-set allotted to them by the Shokugeki's conditions of adhering to French cooking techniques. Both Erina and Hisako talk about his dish compared to Soma's as if they aren't even in the same league, even if Soma presented a fantastic dish. Later, Tsukasa one-ups this perfomance by [[spoiler: utterly destroying a Mimasaka-supported Kuga in their rematch]].
** [[spoiler: Eishi and Rindō are themselves subjected to this when they go against Sōma and Erina in the Regiment de Cuisine.]]
* CurtainsMatchTheWindow: Has white eyes matching his white hair.
* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: The way he feeds the judges during the Regiment de Cuisine, forcing them to take another spoonful of his dish when they're already reeling from overstimulation and how good it is, brings another non-consensual act into mind...
* DontThinkFeel: His culinary philosophy is emptying all his thoughts and feelings while cooking, which, as far as Rindou is concerned, may explain why Eishi is the current First Seat.
* ExtremeDoormat: Despite being the First Seat of the Council, Rindou easily talks him into giving her stuff from his booth or dumps him all her paperwork.
* {{Foil}}: One of many to Soma; while Soma's biggest strength as a cook is inserting his own feelings and personality into his dishes, Tsukasa's biggest strength is his ability to completely remove himself from his dish. In addition, while both Soma and Eishi had small establishments, Soma was able to leave more and more of the cooking up to his friends as customers kept flowing in, while Eishi is so paranoid of his food that he refuses to let anyone else cook. Their attitudes towards customers also differs; Soma grew up believing that while some customers may be selfish and self-serving, satisfying them is still the job of the chef and always keeps their needs in mind when he makes dishes. Eishi grew up to resent serving people because he felt the empty praise they gave him towards his food because of his title was worthless towards his goal of finding "true cuisine", and that none of them understood his efforts.
* GracefulLoser: Self-serving he may be, [[spoiler: he takes his loss to Soma and Erina better than expected, even calmly reflecting on what helped them win]].
* InnocentlyInsensitive: Goes hand and hang with his LackOfEmpathy; due to only ever having food and ways to improve his cooking on his mind, Eishi is completely indifferent to everything else. While not done to be malicious, Kuga notes that any praise that Eishi offers is completely insincere as a result.
* {{Irony}}: His biggest complaint that lead Eishi into his StartOfDarkness by joining Azami was that no-one recognized his efforts when it came to the food he prepared, instead giving him generic platitudes and compliments about how good it was. Years later under Central, Eishi's greatest strength is his skill at completely removing his own influence from the dish and letting it stand completely on it's own, which in turn can lead to nothing ''but'' those generic platitudes and compliments.
* ItsAllAboutMe:
** When Soma says that he has no interest in giving Central his Yukihira cooking, Eishi simply remarks that it's fine and that he just wants Soma's ability as a support to further his own cooking.
** He's like that about everything, really. He also doesn't see anything wrong with this train of thought. For example, during a flashback, he served his food to various groups of people and they praised it to high heaven and showered him with compliments about how sublimely delicious it was. However, he was gravely offended because beyond the generic compliments, no one else recognized the brilliance, the daring and efforts he put in his food.
* KnightInShiningArmor: His overall motif, hence his title "Weißritter der Tafel".
* LackOfEmpathy: He emotionally detaches himself from his own cooking for starters. He also sees nothing wrong with [[spoiler:destroying the livelihoods of others to improve Japan's standards of cuisine]] remarking that "it can't be helped." Improving his own cooking is all that matters to him.
** This extends to his [[NoSocialSkills interpersonal skills too.]] Whenever he tries to recruit someone it's always as a sous chef to augment his own skills, and when he was a child he took paint from another of his classmates without permission to improve his own painting. Never once has he seen anything ''wrong'' with this, even when it's explained to him.
* ManInWhite: His appearance seem to invoke this. He has pale skin, white hair, and he leaves off his uniform jacket that his white shirt is much more prominent. This gives him an ethereal atmosphere whenever he's not in his ShrinkingViolet mode.
* MeaninglessVillainVictory: [[spoiler:He invokes this trope to invalidate the Shokugeki condition that Soma joins Central, since he knows that even if Soma becomes his underling, [[DragonWithAnAgenda he'll just continue doing his own thing]].]]
* MoodSwinger: One second he can be cool, calm and stoic, and the next minute he can turn into a depressed wimp, and vice versa.
* MythicalMotifs: His philosophy of removing "himself" to make his ingredients soar to divine heights of flavor is rather akin to the Buddhist school of thought, where attachment is one of the "Three Poisons" (together with aversion and ignorance).
* NervousWreck: When Rindou invites Soma and Megumi to dine at Eishi's stall, they find that not only is he the only one cooking, but he also keeps asking his guests if he did his preparations right. He has complete confidence in the cooking itself, but he stresses constantly about whether all the minor details like the room temperature and the chairs are comfortable enough.
* PenPushingPresident: PlayedForLaughs. Despite being the no. 1 student in school, Rindo easily orders him around.
* ThePerfectionist: Does all the cooking at his booth because he's paranoid of any aides he might hire making mistakes with his finishing touches, bullied teachers in middle-school unintentionally by ''constantly'' making them test his food (which they claimed was already more than delicious enough and could he please stop bothering them) because "Surely this isn't good enough. Are you sure it's perfect?". He is completely and utterly focused on perfection. He does eventually grow impressed with Souma and challenges him to a shokugeki to recruit him as his personal aide, but changes his mind soon after when he realizes that while Souma does have the ability needed, his personality and behavior are too erratic for Tsukasa to trust.
* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: He's reasonably friendly and unlike the other members of the Elite Ten he has no problems with casually taking on people vastly inferior to himself in Shokugeki. Most other people in the Elite Ten feel like it's a waste of their time.
* RedBaron: He earned the title "Weißritter der Tafel" ("White Knight of the Dining Table") on account of his philosophy towards cooking, namely that he acts as the ingredients' "champion" by emptying himself while cooking in order to fully highlight the flavors of the ingredients themselves.
** More comically, he was also known as "Teacher Crusher Tsukasa" in middle school, where he drove teachers insane by constantly making them test his dishes ''that were better than theirs''.
* SeriousBusiness: One second he can be an insecure wimp, but when it comes down to food and cooking, he turns into a confident Ace Chef.
* ShrinkingViolet: For a First Seat, Eishi is surprisingly very timid. He gets intimidated by crowds of people (which is why he leaves most of the PR of the Autumn Election to Satoshi), and mopes about the pressure and responsibilities his position brings.
* SupremeChef: While this could naturally be applied to the entire Elite Ten and a good bit of the other characters, Tsukasa is currently the apex of cooking in Tootsuki, and according to Rindou he's already famous worldwide among gourmands.
* TroublingUnchildlikeBehaviour: Demonstrated in a flashback. When he was in elementary school, and the students were all painting, a girl sitting next to him created a very pretty blue color. Upon noticing it, he dipped his brush and began using it in his painting without even asking. When scolded for it, he replied that he didn't see anything wrong with what he was doing, as it made his own painting prettier.
* TheUnfettered: Tsukasa wants to improve his cooking. Anything which helps him do so is good, everything which prevents him from doing so is evil.
* VillainousFriendship: Him and Rindou go way back to their first year of middle school, where they became friends after Rindou found him and his reputation as the "Teacher Crusher" intriguing and hung out together ever since. Compared to his relationships with the other members of the Elite Ten and his ItsAllAboutMe attitude, a strong argument can be made that she is his ''only'' real friend.
* WeCanRuleTogether: After Soma does a good job as a sous chef during a lesson, Eishi tries to invite Soma to join Central. He goes so far as to [[spoiler:challenge Soma to a Shokugeki with the following terms: if Eishi loses he'll forfeit the First Seat, and if Soma loses he'll join Central as Eishi's underling.]]
* WhiteHairBlackHeart: Has platinum blond hair and really could not care about anything other than his own cooking. The only one he shows an affection towards is his ChildhoodFriend, Rindou, who sort of shanghaied him into being her friend anyways.
* WorldsBestWarrior: As the First Seat of the Elite Ten, most people consider him the current best chef at Tootsuki and rapidly gaining fame across the world. Even [[spoiler:Kuga with crucial and powerful support from Mimasaka can't even put up a real fight, as Tsukasa proceeds to resoundingly beat him 3-0 regardless]].
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* AbsurdlyPowerfulStudentCouncil: As mentioned above, they have complete control over the funds and budget of the entirety of Tootsuki. They also have the authority to overrule the director himself by majority vote among them.

** Defeating the Elite Ten under Azami's rule is one of the goals of the Rebel Alliance. [[spoiler: Led by Erina and Soma, the Rebels succeed in overthrowing the Elite Ten council, and Erina supersedes Azami as director.]]

* ImprobableAge: She's paid enormous consultation fees just to test new dishes by various restaurants, something she's been doing for years. She's also already a culinary celebrity at age fifteen. Taken even further later on when [[spoiler: after her Dad has been removed from his position, ''she succeeds him as the director of the School.'']]

** [[spoiler:After Azami's ascent as Director, he hired his own judges so any Shokugeki against him by people protesting the new curriculum would always end in his favor.]]

* SmugSnake: He gets along terribly with his fellow classmates, uses people for his own gain and goes along with authorities only if they benefit him financially, even commenting that he only humors Senzaemon if the budget for the Council is still at his disposal. Unsurprisingly [[spoiler:he is part of the group who elected Azami as the new director.]] This nets him a lot of power over the school, but [[spoiler:his composure starts to crack during his Shokugeki against Soma, when it became clear to him that the latter refuses to budge even with the knowledge that the three judges are corrupt, and his attempts at damage control only further sets up his fall after the trio gave ''Soma'' their votes.]]

** Despite complaining about formalities and all the traditions Senzaemon made them fulfill (like the Red Leaf Hunt), he was clearly upset over [[spoiler:his fellow Council members voting Azami as new director, and even boycotts subsequent meetings. This makes sense because, as head of the Chinese RS, Azami's reforms could doom his club. Unfortunately, this makes Azami remove him from the Elite Ten]].

The granddaughter of school headmaster Senzaemon Nakiri and daughter of Azami Nakiri, Erina is the Tenth Seat of the Elite Ten despite being a freshman (and thus its youngest member), also known as "God's Tongue" for her incredibly refined palate. Proud, distant and somewhat petty, she doesn't take well to the fact that Soma, a commoner transferee, was able to cook up something that actually met her incredibly high standards, and thus tries to have him expelled or neglected whenever possible. In the meantime, she keeps mostly to herself, only interacting with her aide Hisako or squabbling with either Soma or her cousin Alice.

The granddaughter of school headmaster Senzaemon Nakiri and daughter of Azami Nakiri, Erina is the Tenth Seat of the Elite Ten despite being a freshman (and thus its youngest member), also known as "God's Tongue" for her incredibly refined palate. Proud, distant and somewhat petty, she doesn't take well to the fact that Soma, a commoner transferee, was able to cook up something that actually met her incredibly high standards, and thus tries to have him expelled or neglected whenever possible. In the meantime, she keeps mostly to herself, only interacting with her aide Hisako or squabbling with either Soma or her cousin Alice. [[[spoiler: Senzaemon appoints her as the new director of Tōtsuki on Sōma's suggestion.]]

The granddaughter of school headmaster Senzaemon Nakiri and daughter of Azami Nakiri, Erina is the Tenth Seat of the Elite Ten despite being a freshman (and thus its youngest member), also known as "God's Tongue" for her incredibly refined palate. Proud, distant and somewhat petty, she doesn't take well to the fact that Soma, a commoner transferee, was able to cook up something that actually met her incredibly high standards, and thus tries to have him expelled or neglected whenever possible. In the meantime, she keeps mostly to herself, only interacting with her aide Hisako or squabbling with either Soma or her cousin Alice.

* TheAce: He is currently the First Seat of the Elite Ten, which means that he is currently the best student at Tootsuki. He's so confident in his skills that Soma and Megumi noted that, even when he's nervous, ''not once'' did he ask if his food was good.

** Defeating the Elite Ten under Azami's rule is one of the goals of the Rebel Alliance. [[spoiler: Led by Erina and Soma, the Rebels succeed in overthrowing the Elite Ten council, although they are yet to boot off Azami.]]

** [[spoiler: On Sōma's and Senzaemon's suggestion, Erina became the new Headmaster at the age of sixteen. Just towarfs the end of her first year in Tōtsuki High]]

* TheAce: Erina belongs to the elite Nakiri family and was a ChildProdigy. She is very popular at Totsuki and is held with high regard. She also made it to the Elite Ten in her First Year itself. She is so talented that she defeated the 3rd Seat Momo Akanegakubo in her own speciality. Teaming up with Soma, they were able to defeat [[spoiler: Eishi Tsukasa (1st Seat) and Rindou Kobayashi (2nd Seat) in the Regimental Shokugeki]]

* ImprobableAge: She's paid enormous consultation fees just to test new dishes by various restaurants, something she's been doing for years. She's also already a culinary celebrity at age fifteen.

* EarlyBirdCameo: The whole Council was first seen in a early manga panel where most of their designs were kept in shadow and probably not finalzed yet. The anime reproduces that panel (illustrated) with the final designs.