Rare and delicious: from monster to meal in Japanese gourmet fantasy manga

Abstract

This study examines how gourmet fantasy manga, particularly Delicious in Dungeon and Campfire Cooking in Another World with My Absurd Skill, reconfigure monstrosity through the act of cooking and consumption. Drawing on textual, semiotic, and cultural hermeneutic analysis, the study argues that such transformations are not merely aesthetic, but grounded in deeper symbolic and cultural logics. The analysis identifies three key dimensions underlying this transformation. First, monsters are culturally and visually constructed through folkloric traditions and recognisable visual features. Drawing on East Asian mythological sources and hybrid creature designs, these manga create beings that appear simultaneously strange and familiar, stimulating readers’ curiosity while preserving associations with fear and danger. Second, through humour, everyday-life storytelling, and recipe-like visual presentation, monsters are domesticated and integrated into daily routines. Detailed cooking processes, infographic-like layouts, and encyclopaedic forms of classification encourage readers to interpret, identify, and even collect knowledge about monsters through familiar culinary frameworks. Third, the act of eating introduces questions of power, ethics, and coexistence. Consuming monsters signifies both dominance within a food chain and a symbolic negotiation of life, particularly when the boundary between human and nonhuman becomes unstable. Together, these narratives position cooking as a mechanism for transforming monsters from objects of fear into objects of curiosity, knowledge, and consumption, offering an alternative model for imagining monstrosity in contemporary popular culture.

The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Journal of Graphic Novels & Comics, 2026 · DOI ↗