Mio's Cookbook (Japanese: みをつくし料理帖) is a 2020 period romance movie from Japan. Directed by Haruki Kadokawa,[1] it was adapted from Kaoru Takada's novel Cookbook of Devotion, Mio’s Cookbook
The film featured at the Toronto Japanese Film Festival in 2021 and the Australian Japanese Film Festvial in 2020.
The movie starts in 1800, showing the friendship of two young girls, Mio and Noe. A flood destroys Osaka where they live and their lives are both destroyed when they lose their families.
The move then moves forward to 1820, but Mio is working in Edo, the Japanese capital. Mio loves cooking [2] and initially fails at the restaurant she works at because she is cooking Osako style. However, as she innovates, her restaurant starts to take off.[3] After her restaurant is burnt down by rivals,[4] she re-builds and a noble protects her from further harm.[5] it is then that she is visited by a man representing a famed courtesan, who comes to her for her Osaka styles cooking.