Project

Regional Food Education Committee

Kyoto City Curriculum Food Education Project

The Japanese Culinary Academy has partnered with the Kyoto City Board of Education since the 2006 academic year, working to bring food education classes to Kyoto municipal elementary schools.
At present, we are members of the “Committee to Promote Food Education Curriculums to Learn About Japanese Cuisine” along with the Kyoto City Board of Education, various experts, domestic science research councils, and representatives of the PTA, where we participate in creating guidelines for food education curriculums and providing food education classes for Kyoto municipal elementary schools.
Each year our members go to seventeen model schools (Kyoto municipal elementary schools) and actually take the podium to teach children about food.

Kyoto University “Tasting Genuine Dashi [soup stock] is Education” Project

This is a project that Kyoto University has been involved with every year since 2008.
Its goal is to introduce the next generation to the refined taste and emotion of dashi, the product of years of wisdom gained in Japanese cuisine.
Through demonstrations by our members and tasting sessions, we give Kyoto University students a chance to experience the flavor of dashi, and bring out their interest in food. (Run by the Kyoto University Graduate School of Agriculture)

The Japan Culinary Art Competition Committee

The Japan Culinary Art Competition Program

The Japan Culinary Art Competition, a contest for professionals, has been held every other year since 2007.
It attracts chefs working in hotels and Japanese restaurants from not only Japan but from around the world, and is covered extensively by the media and other outlets as it provides a gateway to success as a chef.
We hold heats in six regions around Japan to give as many people possible the chance to participate.
This concours de cuisine aims to train the next generation of chefs and breathe new life into Japanese cuisine, with its long traditions and deep local roots.

Holding the Japanese Culinary Academy Workshop Held

This is an open lecture for the general public, held with a different theme each time such as the culture and history of Japanese cuisine, the science of Japanese cuisine, and so on.
These are educational lectures that ordinary people, not just chefs, can enjoy.

Overseas Projects Committee

Japan Culinary Fellowship Program

The Japan Culinary Fellowship has been offered to the world’s top chefs since its start in FY2005.
The world’s greatest chefs have a great deal of influence on world cooking trends, so we aim to give them the chance to come to Kyoto and experience the techniques and history of Japanese cuisine, and its cultural background, and deepen their understanding of it.
Starting with kitchen workshops held in members’ restaurants, we provide a wide-ranging curriculum that covers visits to vegetable growers and tours of miso and tofu production facilities, tea ceremony lessons, and Zen training.
The workshop on the final day of the Fellowship program, where the top global chefs in this program present demonstrations and other aspects of cooking, is open to the general public.

Japanese Cuisine Laboratory Project

We hold a monthly meeting with a research team based around a lab at Kyoto University to explore the possibilities of Japanese cuisine and new academic topics.
We intend to present our project’s research findings at a range of conferences and meetings.

Kyoto: Cuisine Cloud (provisional name) Project

This project is scheduled to kick off in FY2012, with the goal of creating a new information platform for chefs in Japan and around the world.
Is it possible to go beyond national borders, generations, customs, languages, and genres, sharing awareness of issues and exchanging information on a level playing field? This project will be built around “U50” (Under 50s) chefs.

Earthquake Disaster Support Project

Japan Culinary Academy Scholarship Program

We founded the “Japan Culinary Academy Scholarship Program” to provide support and assistance after the Great East Japan Earthquake.
This project is targeted at high school students in the affected areas who intend to become chefs, and provides them with a scholarship to help them enter a cooking school.
It pays for their tuition at the cooking school, as well as their board, and combines this with letting them work part-time in members’ restaurants for hands-on training.
The scholarship provides both economic and environmental support for the year until they gain their chef’s license.
This project is aimed at restoring the food culture of the affected region and creating people who will work hard to develop it in new directions.