The Menu of Happiness by Hisashi Kashiwai Review: Kamogawa Food Detectives #3 Audiobook

✍️ Translated by Jesse Kirkwood
🎧 Listened in audio | 📢 Narrated by Hanoka Footman
⏱ Duration: 5 hours | Genre: Translated Japanese Fiction
🏷️ Publisher name: Penguin Audio | 📅 Published: October 14, 2025

Book Blurb:

Tucked away down a Kyoto backstreet, the Kamogawa Diner is run by Chef Nagare and his daughter, Koishi, who have reinvented themselves as food detectives. Beyond cooking mouthwatering meals, they use culinary sleuthing and the power of taste to rekindle forgotten memories for clients who long to eat one particular dish again. From yakisoba tied to a precious first love to dumplings shared between sworn enemies, each client leaves changed by what they find on the menu. In this third installment of a beloved Japanese bestseller, the diner becomes a door to the past.

Let’s talk about the book:

I can’t believe how amazing this series is. The Menu of Happiness is another gem from the Kamogawa Food Detectives, and it may be my favorite yet.

What makes these books so special is the way they connect human emotion to food. Hisashi Kashiwai writes about every dish and every ingredient with such delicate, passionate attention that you can almost feel the flavors in your body. For such a short book, it carries real depth. Each story captures the emotion tucked inside every morsel, and together they remind you that a meal is never just about satisfying hunger. It calls on all the senses, and on memory too. Who better to show us that than Kashiwai?

At the heart of it all are Chef Nagare and his daughter Koishi, the father-daughter duo who run the Kamogawa Diner, tucked away down a Kyoto backstreet. I adore their quiet partnership. Nagare is the craftsman, recreating long-lost dishes from the faintest of clues, while Koishi is the gentle detective, drawing out the details clients themselves have half forgotten. Their care for the people who walk through the door is what gives the series its warmth. They never treat a request as just a recipe to be solved. They treat it as a memory worth honoring.

The clients are just as memorable. Each arrives carrying a dish they long to taste once more, and behind every request is a whole story: a precious first love tied to a plate of yakisoba, or an unlikely bond between sworn enemies over a shared dumpling. I loved seeing how the meal Nagare finally serves unlocks something deeper than nostalgia, and how each person leaves changed by what they find on the menu. The Kamogawa Diner doesn’t just serve food. It opens a door to the past.

Jesse Kirkwood’s translation reads beautifully, and Hanoka Footman’s narration brings these stories to life with warmth and care. At around five hours, the audiobook is an easy, immersive listen that you could finish in a weekend.

A word of warning: do not read or listen to this on an empty stomach. I listened while eating lunch and still ended up hungry!

Would I recommend it?

Would I recommend The Menu of Happiness by Hisashi Kashiwai? In a heartbeat, and honestly I would press it into your hands if I could. It is my favorite of the Kamogawa Food Detectives so far, a short Kyoto story collection where a chef and his daughter hunt down the one dish a person has never stopped thinking about. If you loved Before the Coffee Gets Cold, add this one to your list RIGHT NOW. Just keep a snack nearby. Five stars from me.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Pull Up Another Chair:

• Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi The obvious one, and for good reason: another small Japanese room where a single moment from the past changes how people carry on.

Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | OpenLibrary | Litsy

• Sweet Bean Paste by Durian Sukegawa If the way Kashiwai writes about food hooked you, this one gives a humble pastry shop the same tender, patient attention.

Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | OpenLibrary | Litsy

• Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto Food as the thing that holds a grieving person together, and a lovely pick if the emotional side of these stories is what you came for.

Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | OpenLibrary | Litsy

• The Full Moon Coffee Shop by Mai Mochizuki Another translated Japanese comfort read with a warm little hangout at its center and the same quiet, healing mood.

Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | OpenLibrary | Litsy

• Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa Short, gentle and easy to finish in a weekend, just like this one, with a Tokyo bookshop in place of a Kyoto diner.

Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | OpenLibrary | Litsy

Which Dish Would You Taste Again?

Okay, your turn. What’s the one dish you would do anything to taste one more time? Who made it for you, and where were you sitting when you ate it? Drop it in the comments, because I want to know. And if you’ve picked up the other Kamogawa Food Detectives books, tell me which one is your favorite, since I’m clearly still deciding.

Book Links:

Want to purchase this or any of your favorite books while supporting a local bookstore? Consider purchasing using the sites below. These sites work with independent local bookstore owners to fulfill your book orders. #SupportLocal

Indiebookstores.ca | Bookshop.org | Goodreads | StoryGraph | Pagebound | Fable | Hardcover | Booktrovert | Litsy
Check out more books from Penguin Audio