| ISANA
Dec. 2002 No.26 |
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1- 2 - 3
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EATING IS BELIEVING - WHALE DIET CULTURE EXPERIENCE SEMINAR
"Let's eat whale
meat and think about the whaling issue"
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Hisashi Hamaguchi
Associate Professor,
Sonoda Women's College |
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Since
the academic year 1995, the present writer has been teaching a course
on the whaling cultures of various places of the world to students
specializing in international food culture at Sonoda Women's College.
According to a questionnaire carried out in the classroom, the ratio
of new students having the experience of eating whale cuisine showed
a gradual decline from 79% in 1996 to 67% in 1997, 68% in 1998, 58%
in 1999, 43% in 2000 and 41% in 2001. It has been a long time since
whale cuisine disappeared from school lunches and the tables of ordinary
households. Considering this phenomenon, the experience of young people
eating whale will continue to decrease in the years ahead.
My college carried
out a whale cooking and eating seminar in 1995 with whale meat supplied
from the Group to Preserve Whale Dietary Culture (See Isana No. 14).
In recent years, a number of students expressed to me the hope to
eat whale meat. Based on my experience in the classroom, young women
still consider whales as food while they also regard them as objects
of observation and amusement. I thought it possible to hand down the
whale diet culture if whale food is served when the young people feel
like eating it.
It is against
this background that the Whale Diet Culture Experience Seminar took
place on December 9, 2001, with a supply of whale meat and other products
from the specimens taken in Japan's 2nd-Phase Northwestern Pacific
Whale Research Catch Program in 2001 by the Institute of Cetacean
Research (ICR). During this seminar, the second-year students specializing
in international food culture demonstrated the cooking of whale products
in the morning as part of the class activities. Other students and
invited guests took part in a trial eating session of prepared foods
at lunchtime. In the afternoon, students attended a lecture under
the theme of "Whales and Whaling" by Mr. Kazuo Yamamura, a Board member
of the ICR. A total of 130 people participated in the eating session,
including students from China and Korea, and 80 students attended
the lecture session. That means some attended only the eating session,
but it must have served half the purpose of this undertaking. |
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After
the lecture, a simple questionnaire was made among the participants.
It first asked the students whether they had eaten whale meat before.
Students were then asked to assess the six items of whale cuisine
served in the eating session under the five categories of (1) very
tasty, (2) tasty, (3) neither good nor bad, (4) not so tasty, and
(5) not tasty at all. The six items served were sashimi (raw whale
meat), tatsuta-age (fried whale meat), harihari-nabe (whale meat boiled
with vegetables), shigure-ni (whale meat cooked in soy sauce), bacon
and whale meat soup. A total of 69 students responded to the questionnaire.
Regarding the
experience of eating whale meat, 48% responded yes as against 52%
who replied no. Probably because some people of advanced age, such
as parents and college employees, were among the respondents, the
results exceeded 41%--the figure of a similar questionnaire conducted
only on new students at the start of the school year. The results
showed that slightly over half of the respondents ate whale meat for
the first time. What follows are their impressions of their first
encounter with whale meat.
If we consider
"Very tasty" and "Tasty" combined as a favorable assessment and "Not
so tasty" and "Not tasty at all" as an unfavorable assessment, tatsuta-age
topped the list with a favorable assessment of 85%, followed by harihari-nabe
and sashimi with 48% each and bacon with 39%. From this we can conclude
that the support rate for whale dishes is high among young women.
This reflects the tendency of young women to favor fried food and
refrain from too greasy food such as bacon.
One unexpected
result was the high evaluation of the whale soup. It should have tasted
greasy because whale blubber is used. But the fat and lye must have
been removed well. On the other hand, the taste of the harihari-nabe
sauce was a little thin- a probable cause of the lower evaluation.
It is difficult to cook strictly according to a recipe when you cook
for over 100 people. Also it was a student trial, and they could learn
from failure. This should be left for future practice. |
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What
follows are some general comments by the students.
"I imagined that
whale meat was hard. But this perception disappeared by today's experience.
Especially, I found sashimi very easy to eat because it was not hard
and smelly. It tasted like tuna red meat."
"Whale dishes
tasted half fish and half meat. I found harihari-nabe and whale soup
a bit smelly. I found tatsuta-age tasty."
"After eating
various whale dishes, I thought tatsuta-age and shigure-ni suit the
Japanese taste. I consider whaling is an important culture. Now I
am not against whaling."
The present author
makes it a rule to lecture about whaling culture and whale diet culture
for a semester of every school year. I found it difficult to have
students with no experience of eating whale food to appreciate the
importance of whaling culture. Because of anti-whaling publicity through
the media, at times questions arose as to whether or not whale is
a food. But, after eating, students came to be convinced that whale
is a food. Truly, eating is believing.
Fortunately,
my college has cooking facilities, and cooking lessons are being given
to students. It is the wish of the present author that he will make
the best use of this learning environment and continue to study more
about whaling culture and whale diet culture. (Of course, over a table
of whale dishes at times.) |
Questionnaire
regarding the sampling of whale dishes (N=69)
|
Very
tasty |
Tasty |
Not
good nor bad |
Not
so tasty |
Not
tasty at all |
| Tatsuta-age |
26% |
59% |
15% |
- |
- |
| 85% |
- |
| Shigure-ni |
38% |
41% |
18% |
3% |
- |
| 79% |
3% |
| Whale
soup |
27% |
52% |
17% |
2% |
2% |
| 79% |
4% |
| Sashimi |
24% |
24% |
40% |
6% |
6% |
| 48% |
12% |
| Harihari-nabe |
8% |
40% |
34% |
10% |
8% |
| 48% |
18% |
| Bacon |
11% |
28% |
25% |
14% |
22% |
| 39% |
36% |
|
College students
cooking harihari-nabe during the seminar |
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