A Serving of Hope

Book 4: A Kamogawa Food Detectives Novel

by Hisashi Kashiwai

Genres: General Fiction; Family Life; Literary Fiction; Mystery; Cozy Mystery; Animal Cozy Mysteries

Synopsis

Discover new delicious mysteries in this fourth installment in The Kamogawa Food Detectives series, the beloved Japanese bestseller and celebration of the healing power of food.

“Off-beat and charming, [with] more complexity of flavor than you might expect.” – NPR – Fresh Air with Terry Gross

“Miso soup for the soul.” —Kirkus Reviews

If I hadn't searched for the 'flavors' of my memories, I think I would have spent my life endlessly chasing the past . . .

Down a Kyoto alleyway, near Higashi Honganji Temple, the Kamogawa Diner attracts lost souls. The father-daughter “food detective” duo of Chef Nagare and Detective Koishi help their clientele who seek meaning in their lives by helping them access lost memories through the food of their past.

From the onigiri gifted alongside cherished promises to the ginger pork that became a memory of unrequited love, the not-too-sour chilled noodles from grandma's house, and the macaroni gratin shared by a father and young son for the last time, there is no dish or memory too complex for father and daughter.  

Welcome to another delicious mystery. The Kamogawa Diner is a tonic for the soul, and its customers will leave with a warm belly and a full heart.

Release date: October 6, 2026

Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons

Print pages: 224

Sample

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Chapter 1

Miso Soup

1

There couldn't be many people who made it past thirty without ever visiting Kyoto, but Kenichi Yoshizawa was one of them. As he paced briskly north along Karasuma-dori, he found himself mentally comparing the city he knew so well from television and magazines with the one unfolding in front of him.

He'd had opportunities to travel in the past, but his studies had always come first. The idea of indulging in something as leisurely as a sightseeing trip-whether to Kyoto or anywhere else-had never even crossed his mind.

Kenichi had heard all about the city's scorching summers and freezing winters. What he hadn't expected was this clammy humidity, arriving before the rainy season had even set in. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at his forehead.

Kyoto Tower. Higashi Honganji temple. The names were familiar enough, but seeing them with his own eyes was something else. He felt a strange pang of nostalgia, as though he'd been reunited with an old friend.

From the central exit of Kyoto station, it took him ten minutes to reach a weathered two-story building that matched the description he'd read. This had to be it. He slid the door open and called out, "Hello?"

A young woman in a black sommelier apron turned toward him. "Good afternoon!"

"Is this the Kamogawa Diner?"

"Well, yes," she replied, eyeing him curiously.

Kenichi smiled with relief. He was in the right place, then. All that research had paid off.

A man dressed in a traditional, loose-fitting samue emerged from the kitchen. "Here to eat?"

"Actually," said Kenichi, producing his business card, "I was hoping you might be able to track down a dish for me."

"Ah." The man passed the card to the young woman. "My daughter handles that side of things."

"Gardenia Legal Services . . . Tokyo," she said, glancing up at him. "Are you a lawyer?"

"Just a clerk at the firm. I'm still studying for the bar-though I know I look a little old for that."

She gave a small nod. "I'm Koishi Kamogawa, head of the Kamogawa Detective Agency. And this is my dad, Nagare, who runs the restaurant."

Nagare removed his cap and bowed politely before setting it back on his head. "You must be hungry. If you don't mind having the set menu, I can bring it out right away."

Kenichi's expression brightened. "That'd be wonderful."

"Anything you're not so keen on?" Nagare asked.

"Well, I didn't grow up by the sea, so I've never been much of a fan of saltwater fish-mackerel, sardines, that sort of thing. Too oily for me. Otherwise, I'll eat anything. And I do love my vegetables."

"Got it. I'll have something ready in a moment." Nagare slipped past the noren curtain and into the kitchen.

"So how did you hear about us?" Koishi asked.

"I found you online. I searched for food detectives. A few places came up, but yours seemed the most reliable."

"Well, how about that . . ." Koishi grinned as she showed him to a table. "I guess we must be famous. So-you're a fan of vegetables?"

"My family runs a farm. You could say I was raised on them." Kenichi sat on one of the folding chairs and glanced around the restaurant.

Koishi's face lit up. "A farm? Sounds idyllic."

"It's probably not quite how you're picturing it. When I think of home, all I see is my mother scrabbling about in the dirt in her overalls." He wiped the sweat from his neck with a hand towel.

"Thanks for waiting," said Nagare, arriving with the food on a silver tray.

"Something to drink?" Koishi asked. "We have all sorts."

"I'm not much of a drinker," Kenichi said, "but I am thirsty. A beer would be perfect."

"Draft or bottle?" asked Nagare.

"One of the small bottles, if you have them."

"Of course." Nagare hurried back to the kitchen.

"The humidity can be unbearable at this time of year," said Koishi, pulling a white towel from her pocket and dabbing at her brow. "Once it gets sticky like this, you know the heat is here to stay."

"I used to complain about the cold winters back home," Kenichi said, pressing his own towel to his neck again as he eyed the food on the tray. "This is almost making me miss them."

"Shall I give you a quick run-through?" asked Nagare, returning to his side.

Kenichi leaned forward. "Please."

"As Koishi was saying, Kyoto can get quite muggy at this time of year, which doesn't exactly do wonders for the appetite. But there are also plenty of ingredients that are at their best right now, and those are what I've focused on here. In the glass bowl in the top left is ayu sashimi-segoshi-style, with the soft bones left in-dressed with myoga ginger and perilla. Try it with the vinegared miso or the wasabi soy sauce. Alongside that is hamo eel tempura, served with curry salt. The small Karatsu plate on the right is lightly seared Omi beef, paired with an amanatsu ponzu sauce for a citrus kick. If you like, you can add a little grated garlic to the ponzu. On the left of the middle row is steamed pork-try that with the Korean-style sweet-and-spicy sauce, or just the mustard soy sauce if you want to keep things simple. In the Koimari bowl in the center is the uzaku: grilled eel and finely sliced Kema cucumber tossed in black rice vinegar. On the right is a mini beef-cutlet sandwich, made with lean Ishigaki beef. The bottom row is a Kyoto vegetable salad, though I've never been entirely sure what qualifies as a Kyoto vegetable. Greens, onions, and root vegetables from a farmer I know, dressed with sesame sauce and chopped shibazuke pickles. Sprinkle a little ichimi pepper over it if you like. And instead of rice today, I'm serving a sobagome-zosui, a sort of buckwheat porridge. Just let me know when you'd like me to bring that out."

With a smile, Nagare returned to the kitchen, Koishi following close behind.

Alone in the dining area, Kenichi sipped his beer and wondered where to start.

After trying a bit of the salad, he set his chopsticks down. "Kyoto vegetables, eh . . ."

He reached for a piece of ayu sashimi, dipped it in the vinegared miso, and slipped it into his mouth. It tasted so unlike anything he'd ever eaten that he wasn't sure what to make of it. Maybe people thought of this sort of thing as a delicacy, but it wasn't the kind of flavor that left him craving more.

Then again, he'd never been that interested in food. Maybe it was only natural that he had no idea how to judge it.

"How is it, then?" asked Nagare, who had arrived at his side.

"It's delicious," Kenichi replied tactfully.

"Glad to hear it." Nagare glanced at the empty bottle. "Another beer?"

"No, thank you. Think I've had enough."

"All right then. Just let me know when you're ready for the buckwheat porridge." The chef slipped back through the curtain with the empty beer bottle. Kenichi watched him leave, then reached for the cutlet sandwich and took a bite.

"Wow," he murmured.

The meat was just the right firmness, releasing a rush of rich juices as he chewed. The lightly toasted bread was the perfect match for the cutlet, and a ketchup-style sauce tied it all together. Nagare had said it was Ishigaki beef-from Okinawa, then. But the bread: Was it just ordinary store-bought bread? Kenichi felt a sudden wave of curiosity about the food in front of him. He chewed slowly, tilting his head from side to side, bewildered by the change that had come over him.

Next he reached for the uzaku.

His late father had loved eel, but their hometown had never had a decent eel restaurant. Even after he fell ill, he would often ask for it, and Kenichi's mother would drive nearly an hour to a place near Zenkoji temple to buy kabayaki, eel grilled in a soy-based sauce. She would slice up one of their own cucumbers, mix it with thin strips of the eel, and dress it with sweet vinegar before setting it down in front of his father.

Out in the countryside, eel had been a rare and expensive indulgence. He remembered being allowed a single bite, but the faintly muddy flavor of freshwater eel hadn't exactly charmed his taste buds. The uzaku he was eating now, though, felt like an entirely different dish.

He decided to return to the Kyoto vegetables. He took a slice of the onion and ate it plain-and was astonished by its sweetness.

He'd eaten onions all his life, in endless stir fries, stews, and salads. But no matter how they'd been cooked, they'd always just been . . . well, onions. Sharp, pungent, and never like this. It was as sweet as fruit.

The vegetables of his childhood seemed to pale in comparison to these Kyoto specialties. In fact, as odd as it sounded, they were almost too delicious.

"Shall I bring that porridge through?" asked Nagare, returning with impeccable timing.

"Please."

For what felt like the first time in his life, Kenichi found himself looking forward to the next dish.

As a child, he'd eaten soba almost every day. Not in the form of noodles, but as sobagaki, where the buckwheat flour was mashed into a ball. And that, too, he didn't remember ever particularly enjoying. The sticky texture, the slightly grassy aroma. Back then, soba had always felt like a symbol of his family's poverty, and to this day he couldn't quite bring himself to enjoy it.

"Here we go," said Nagare, setting a small iron pot before him and lifting the lid.

Kenichi peered through the billowing steam. "This is sobagome-zosui, then?"

"Have you heard of Iya, in Tokushima?"

"Yes. Famous for those vine bridges, isn't it?"

"That's right. That, and all those stories about survivors from the Heike clan who fled there after the Genpei War. They're said to have started the custom of eating soba grains whole. Having fled to the village of Higashi-Iya, and missing the capital of Kyoto terribly, they made this porridge for the New Year. The ingredients are simple enough: chicken breast, thinly sliced daikon radish and carrot, dried shiitake, and a mitsuba garnish. It's the texture and aroma of the soba grains that really make the dish."

Nagare smiled warmly. Kenichi reached for the porcelain spoon and stirred the porridge lightly. Then he scooped some up, blew on it, and slid it into his mouth.

It didn't taste like poverty, that was for sure. Alternating between the large grains of buckwheat, the vegetables, and the broth, he found that each spoonful tasted subtly different. Savoring a single bowl of porridge at such length wasn't something he'd ever thought possible. Once he'd finished the very last grain, he set the spoon back down and, almost instinctively, joined his palms in gratitude.

"Can I get you another bowl?" asked Nagare, arriving from the kitchen with a tray.

"No, thank you." Kenichi bowed from his seat. "But that was incredible."

"Well, once you've had a moment to digest, I'll show you through."

"I'm ready now, if you don't mind. I don't want to keep Koishi waiting."

"Not at all. I hope you don't feel rushed."

"Actually, I can't remember the last time I lingered like that over a meal."

Nagare turned to him with a smile. "The best compliment a chef can get. This way, please."

He guided Kenichi down a hallway leading to the rear of the building. Its walls were lined with pinned photos, mostly of food. Nagare's creations, presumably.

"She'll take it from here," said the chef. He opened a door at the end of the hallway to reveal Koishi waiting behind a low table. She had changed into a black pantsuit.


“Could you fill this out, please?” Koishi asked, handing him a clipboard as he sat down on the sofa opposite her. On it was a short form.

Kenichi leaned forward and, setting the clipboard down on the table, filled out the entire form in less than a minute.

"Let's see," said Koishi, retrieving the clipboard. "Kenichi Yoshizawa, age thirty. You work for a law firm, and you live in . . . Machida? Where is that again? Somewhere near Tokyo?"

"You sound like my mother," replied Kenichi with a wry grin. "No matter how many times I explain it to her, she never quite gets it."

"Commuting into Shinjuku every day must be rough," sighed Koishi. She had brought up a map on her tablet and was swiping around on it.

"When I first moved there from the countryside, it really wore me down, but I'm used to it now. And on an income like mine, it's not like living downtown is even an option."

Koishi put the tablet down. "So, what's the dish you want us to find?"

"Miso soup."

"Okay. A special type of miso soup?"

"No. Just the ordinary kind."

"And where did you have it?" asked Koishi, flipping open a notebook.

"At home. My mother used to make it for me."

Koishi jotted this down. "Ah. Can't beat your own mom's cooking."

"She made me a bowl every morning, all the way up until the end of high school. Miso soup and rice."

"That's what, twelve years? Sounds like real devotion."

"Even longer, I think. She started making it for me when I was still in nursery school, though I'm a little hazy on the details."

"So she'd get up early, make the miso soup, then head out into the fields. And your father?"

Kenichi dropped his gaze. "He was quite frail, and couldn't really help out much on the farm. He was in and out of the hospital all the time."

"What a job your mom must have had. I don't think I could manage . . . Now, what kind of miso soup are we talking about?"

"What . . . kind? Just regular miso soup."

"But what sort of miso-red or white?"

"Well, it wasn't red, but it wasn't exactly white either. More of a yellowish color."

"I forgot to ask. Where exactly did you grow up?"

"A place called Obuse, in Nagano."

"Ah, Nagano. Probably Shinshu miso, then."

"You think?"

"Well, the color would certainly match." Koishi scribbled another note. "You said your family ran a farm. What did you grow?"

"A mix of things. Mostly apricots, apples, and chestnuts, from what I remember. My mother and the other local farmers would work from first thing in the morning until sundown."

"You didn't grow any vegetables, then?"

"Not to sell. But we cultivated plenty for our own use-onions, potatoes, cucumbers, tomatoes, cabbages, leeks, you name it. My mother had this little patch she'd tend between stretches in the fields. She still sends me onions and potatoes, so I guess it must be going strong."