MAGICAL CABBAGE
Impression
To me, this episode actually covered less than I thought it would: I thought we’d get to the alumni tasting Megumi’s dish and casting their votes. But I’m fine with how it turned out – we can just say the episode didn’t have much room to cover as much as it wanted because the size of Soma’s balls took up too much space. I do wonder how much he knew about Shinomiya and his credentials before challenging him, but I get the feeling that it wouldn’t have changed much, if at all. The way they’ve presented Shinomiya highlights him as a true food titan even amongst the Tootsuki alumni – he’s found success as a chef of gourmet food in Paris, and was the First Seat of the Elite Ten whilst at Tootsuki. Not sure if that’s the first time they’ve mentioned that, but that means a lot – and the manga readers now know exactly what it means to go up against one of the Elite Ten in a Shokugeki. If that wasn’t already intimidating enough, the main ingredient as stipulated by Doujima is vegetables, which happens to be Shinomiya’s specialty as the Legumes Magician. Objectively, even for Soma the success rate is pretty much 0%.
If we take into account the fact that Megumi is the main chef, and Soma is merely the sous-chef, then the success rate starts to dip into the negatives. Megumi thinks so at least. And I can’t blame her – even if you disregard this whole incident, Megumi has been suffering from a crippling lack of self-confidence for a while now, and this is what’s been hurting her cooking whenever it counts. It was horrible seeing her struggle with the situation before Soma managed to snap her out of her fear – although it was also cute when she was fuming at him for his recklessness. It’s an act of defiance against Shinomiya to present a terrine for the Shokugeki, given that Shinomiya initially failed her for changing the recette for his terrine – if she wins, Shinomiya will be forced to admit that she can make a terrine that has merit to it. That’ll be hard, though. Even though all the alumni disapprove of Shinomiya’s personality (he would ‘crush them so hard they’d never be able to cook again’) they admit that, objectively, that his chou farci was delicious. Hinako is no exception – the Megumi-chan she loves will actually have to produce a good dish.
Finally, I think we really are moving towards comedy with these foodgasm scenes. The most and only erotic reaction was Mizuhara, but the rest of them were just hilarious. Joining the ranks of competitors Megumi and Erina, and reigning best girl Arisu, I present to you CABBAGE PINK!
I’m enjoying Shinomiya’s and Hinako’s interactions a little too much. This episode was pretty amusing and there were a lot of scenes that were really fun.
I’m worried about what’s going to happen next week though. No matter how I think about it, I can only see Shinomiya doing better than Megumi and Soma because he did already graduate with the first seat of the elite ten. I’m not sure how he’s going to lose to them, but he kind of has to because the show has to go on. And he was crying in the preview. What does it mean?!!
Their interactions are definitely highly entertaining. People are already drawing animations based on it and that’s great!
Shino isn’t bringing his A-game, well, not unless A stands for arrogance. I’m sure that’ll be his undoing and frankly, it isn’t impossible that Megumi and Souma could create a Terrine that’s superior to both of their previous attempts given that they were literally just schooled on how to make one. Thus, the judges will taste a Terrine enhanced by a) a confident Megumi b) “proper” vegetables and last but not least c) the combined skill of Megumi and Souma!
The other possibility is that given his tears in the preview, perhaps Shino will get Ratatouille-d (lovely Pixar-Disney cooking movie) and taste Megumi’s personal version of a Terrine (since she seems to be channeling her mother’s spirit). Thus in addition to the aforementioned enhancements, it will also remind him of a home-cooked meal and have to admit that an alternate recipe can be worth of him! …and that his competitive methods were just wrong.
I keep thinking the board around her neck when she was tied up reads: ‘please do not feed’!
Do remember it’s an unofficial Shokugeki that only existed because of Doujima, who thinks that weight should be given to Megumi’s creativity in approaching the initial task. In a situation as novel as this, who’s to say that winning and losing outright are the only two possible outcomes?
Too much Pink energy is dangerous, indeed.
Cabbage Pink was slightly more awesome when his clothing seemed like it had armor plating. Just as an example I mean something like Saber’s outfit!
His muscles are the armor plating. In fact, the cabbage leaves look too flimsy in light of all his manliness.
I don’t know how, but the anime is making me like Hinako wayyy more than the manga did. I don’t remember thinking much about her and when she showed up one time after a while of not appearing I even forgot who she was >._<)/ I have such a bad memory.
You forgot Hinako?! Actually yeah I didn’t recognize her at first either in the manga arc that recently finished.
The animation and voice acting must be helping 😀 Other than that, this adaptation is following the manga very faithfully!