Make your own plastic food on Peninsula Tokyo course
One of the few Japanese sample-food makers still working by hand shows hotel guests how to make fake ramen, tempura, and ice cream sundaes out of plastic
I'm standing at a kitchen sink in Tokyo shaping a sheet of submerged plastic into a "lettuce". Fake food samples are a familiar sight in restaurants in Japan and Japanese restaurants in Hong Kong. They entice customers inside and simplify ordering for foreigners. And I'm learning to make them - thanks to The Peninsula hotel Tokyo's Fun of Faux Food academy programme.
There may be as many as 200 sample factories operating in Japan - and Yamato is one of the few making small batches by hand. Second generation owner Yuichi Ito was born in Gujo Hachiman in the Gifu prefecture, which has been a centre of the food sample industry since the 1940s and is still known as "wax food town".
The windows of his workshop are packed with replicas of sushi, yakitori, grilled fish and Western dishes. Originally they were made from wax but now they use a more durable PVC.
I'm feeling intimidated but my teachers, Yuichi, his son Ryo and their assistant Aomi Chino couldn't be more welcoming with their beaming smiles.
We start with tempura - or its side serving of lettuce. Ryo made it look so easy: a scoop of white liquid lowered gently into the warm water then spread into an oblong with the spoon, three scoops of green liquid gently lined along three sides. My oblong is not as uniform as Ryo's so I fear my lettuce is going to be a giant monstrosity unlike Ryo's neat baby one.
Then the fun begins. I'm told to dip my hands into the water and pull the plastic downwards. Remarkably, a definite lettuce texture and colour emerges. Suddenly, I'm directed to scoop the sides of the oblong together. It's all quite frantic and I keep scooping. Then something miraculous happens: a lettuce shape appears. "Cute!" says Ryo.
