Another Japanese know-it-all but I love her

Japanese Women Don't Get Old or Fat: Secrets of My Mother's Tokyo Kitchen

by Naomi Moriyama, William Doyle

A celebration of her mother--with recipes!  The best kind of memoir + how-to + recipe book. Lots to read and lots to learn. Of course it's preachy and authoritative--that goes with the game. But it's all told from personal experience. You can argue--oh, but a diet of fish, soy, rice, vegetables and fresh fruit may be fine for her, but that doesn't mean it's for everybody. And you may be right. So what?  There's a lot more to the book than just lifestyle advice.

And, even though the first part is awfully preachy, it's gentle. She writes about first coming to study in America at a college near Chicago. The portion sizes of American foods shocked her--
    Nobody ate like this in Japan, and I assumed I never would either. Little did I know this was the beginning of my journey through the American way of serving and eating, or more precisely, the beginning of My Fat Years.
 ...
Within a few months of arriving in America, I had gained 25 pounds.

When she went back to Tokyo again, she moved in with her family and resumed eating home cooking, and--

Between the walking-intensive Tokyo lifestyle and my mother's home cooking, the extra 25 pounds began to miraculously melt away. I didn't do anything conscious to lose the weight; I simply went back to my mother's Tokyo kitchen and the Japanese urban way of life.
And suddenly one day I found I could easily fit into all my old clothes.

And the rest of the book is a delightful, chatty, celebration of her mother's cooking.  With recipes, techniques, ingredients and all kinds of helpful notes. It's all about the food--fresh food, lightly touched, beautifully arranged, gratefully consumed.

For most of my life, my knowledge of Japanese cooking consisted of two words--sushi and tempura. Raw fish and batter fried vegetables.  That's as silly as thinking that all of American cooking consists of steak and potato salad.  This is real home cooking--Japanese style.