Japanese American Food: Communities: Urban Centers in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and San Jose, California, and Seattle, Washington

Japanese American communities were more meaningful, and Japan less, with each generation. Parents tried to maintain cultural norms, and such things as the quality of soy sauce reflected a family’s adherence to these norms. As one Los Angeles resident said in an interview, “We used Chinese shoyu for our restaurant but saved the Japanese shoyu for the family.” Harumi Befu, in an interview, remembered that an easy way of identifying a nikkei (the first four generations of Japanese immigrants) house was the Kikkoman soy sauce barrels in front adorning both sides of the entrance, often serving as containers for box trees. A family meal remembered by Harry Kitano in his 1980 sociological study of nikkei family life epitomized the interaction of generations:

All family members are present. The issei mother announces that she has made a very simple dinner (kantan no mono) but the children understand that she would say this even if she had been cooking for days beforehand. … The food is a mixture of Japanese and American dishes. The main dish is thinly sliced meat cooked with mixed vegetables, but yesterday’s leftover spaghetti is also available as filler. … The food … includes large quantities of rice and Japanese pickles. … Father is served first, then sons in descending order of age, sisters, and finally, mother. … The children attempt to ignore the slurping noise father makes when he drinks his soup, but they find it intolerably embarrassing on the rare occasions when non-Issei guests are present. … The girls, who are counting calories, suffer in silence. … Discipline is carried on throughout the meal—sister spills milk and is firmly warned against sloppy, lower-class behavior. … Occasionally the good conduct of other Japanese children is introduced to serve as an example or model to follow. (Kitano, 1988, pp. 72–73)