Amaama to Inazuma

I loved the first episode. Tsugumi is adorable and one of the best representation of children I've seen. I really feel sorry for her. Her mom died, her father is working long hours and she has to eat convenience store packed meals. And yet, she's so cheerful and nice. Every parent would wish to have a child like that.

I also like Kotori, she wants to learn to cook so badly, but her mother is not around to teach her. And she's hilarious.

This is definitely the slice of life anime of the season. Now I just have to buy some insulin to get me through this.

I've been reading the manga, and it's so cute. Just watched the anime too, great first episode.

Tsugumi is adorable, you don't always see children in manga/anime as sweet as she is.

Kotori is a good cook actually, trust me when I say she knows her stuff. But she's still learning and isn't as experienced as her mother.

Seeing her panic about cooking rice makes this look improbable, but I'll take your word for it.

Also hard to believe plain rice is as delicious as they are making it out to be. But maybe Tsugumi was just happy she didn't have to eat alone for once. The poor child seem a bit neglected.

I believe the problem was because of some sort of measurement thingy they didn't have at the moment that she was used to using.

Well she did add Sake to the rice so that must've been what gave it some flavor. I had actually forgotten about that myself.

Having read the manga, Kotori is not a good cook, even in comparison to people her age. She just has a lot of advice from her mom that she's never gotten a chance to put into practice. I mean, she's not comically terrible at it like you often see in anime, so she can follow a well-written recipe, but there's nothing about her skills I would describe as "good".

Having also read the manga, I'm gonna have to seriously disagree with you there. Not as good as most people her age? It's not like we even see other people her age cook that often. Yes she follows her mom's recipes but a lot of the things she cooks are not simple meals and she does a fantastic job making it all come out just right which isn't always an easy thing to do. The only thing I can really think of that keeps her from being a better cook is a spoiler I won't mention right now.

She gets compared unfavorably with her best friend (who's in the opening). She's the type who freezes up as soon as anything unexpected happens because she has zero "cooking instinct." She lacks the physical muscle memory to do routine cooking prep-work. All she does is precisely follow recipes that she knows will work because she's seen her mother make them. Which is maybe more impressive than some people, but I wouldn't describe that as "good at cooking" in any fashion. It's just a realistic portrayal of a novice. Nothing she's ever done seems like something I couldn't do, for example, and I'm terrible.

Edit: Which is kind of the point since the manga has do-it-yourself recipes at the end of every chapter.

edited 6th Jul '16 4:28:57 PM by Clarste

Maybe that sounded a bit too hostile, but my point was that the thesis of the manga (in regards to cooking) is that it doesn't take talent or being a natural-born housewife to make a good meal for your family, it just takes putting aside the time to make a serious effort. Anyone can cook if they put their mind to it, and maybe they'd be more well-rounded people if they did so.

edited 7th Jul '16 2:59:09 AM by Clarste

She's a good cook in comparison to Inuzaku, who apparantly could only prepare instant meals before he met her and started the cooking lessons together. But it doesn't help that she's afraid of knives. She also gets better as she teaches. And that's actually one of the strong points of the manga/anime, of not being a super cook and still being able to cook tasty meals.

As for why the cooked rice taste so good to Tsumugi, it's been months since she actually have ate freshly cooked rice. She's been eating Microwaved package and convenience store packaged food. Sure they have rice, but they're never freshly cooked.

Episode 2:

Inuzuka tries to cook. He does pretty poorly, but it's the though that counts. And well, practice makes perfect.

Aww, poor Kotori her family situation is none too good. Also, why is she eating alone? Is she bullied? D:

Pffft, Tsugumi trying to wink, hilarious.

Yep, this is definitely cooking by rookies. Especially those cut vegetables. I also like how they didn't actually manage to cook all they planned. Cooking can take surprisingly long time when you a rookie.

Well, this seals the deal. They will come back. How nice.

The translated chapters don't really say anything about why Kotori's mom isn't at home a lot, but I think the raws eventually reveal that she's been working two jobs, and one of them was being an assistant at a small channel's cooking show.

I think they was asking about why she was eating alone at lunch. They'd have to be quite impressive bullies to affect her mother's work schedule.

The answer is that it wasn't lunch yet and she snuck out to eat between class periods because she is obsessed with food. Although her social life gets elaborated on later.

Yeah, that's what I meant. Good thing it's only her food obsession, that girl has it hard enough already.

Also, they really did good job with Tsugumi's drawings. They look like something a child would actually draw.

There's an actual child credited for the drawings in the credits.

They are really going an extra mile with this.

Talk about unrealistic kids. Tsumugi actually likes veggies. Though she also fails at winking which is kids her age actually should fail to do. I also really like how realistic the cooking was here. No lethal chefs, just usual newbie stuff like being awkward with the knives, cutting up the radish unevenly, eating up a lot of time, etc.

Wow.

Episode 3:

Did Kotori actually bride her hair before even coming down? She seemed half asleep by then. Also does she has to walk through the street to get breakfast every morning? Don't they have like a backdoor connecting their house with the restaurant?

This is what keeps her mother away from restaurant and her own daughter? This better pay well.

Finally a successful breakfast, mostly. Also, those must be the cutest socks ever.

I like how Kotori just got to Inuzuka to complain.

Aww, Tsugumi has such a good friends. And then this little shit had to ruin things. At least his mother is a reasonable woman.

Pouting Tsugumi is adorable.

I can't understand anime fascination with Hamburg steak. It's a super simple basic meal.

They seriously don't know how onions work? Also, those instructions were super clear and easy to understand, I'm actually impressed.

Kotori is right, if parents just listened to kids for a change, this would go much smoother.

Okay, this actually looks delicious. I must try adding fried egg on top.

Aww, it's his birthday, and Tsugumi remembered. Also, this means his wife died very recently.

Kotori offering the best part of her steak was nice.

Pretty good episode.

I was wondering about that. In the manga we didn't see the scene of her waking up, just her walking into the restaurant, so the implication was that she slept with her hair braided for whatever reason.

Fell asleep with it stil in? I've done that

First episode mentioned it was only half a year ago his wife died.

Episode 4: The epic battle with green peppers.

Seriously, what's with Japanese kids and green peppers? Are they really so bitter?

Oh god, Tsugumi with pigtails is so adorable! Also, smug Tsugumi.

Hey look, Kotori has a friend!

They really discussed the issue from many different perspectives, which I found nice.

Good work making the cooking fun. Kotori would make a good mother.

This might be the most complex recipe yet. And now I want to eat it.

I'm actually impressed how Tsugumi moved all those pieces of green pepper like that.

Adorable episode as always.

I really love that whole scene. Her classmates are treating her as aloof and almost unapproachable because of the way she looks, and then her old friends barges in and they just shout their conversation across the room. "Made any friends yet?" "Not yet."

Hehe, yeah that scene was great. They think she's aloof and hard to approach and then her friend show up and they start screaming across the room. Hilarious.

D: I love green bell peppers! I've never tasted any bitterness from them, though. Maybe my tongue is just not sensitive?

I've heard someone say that Japanese green peppers have more bitterness to them (due to the soil or something?). Can't confirm that.