A Japanese cooking show whose first episode aired 65 years ago has entered the Guinness Book of World Records as the longest-running cooking show, Japanese public television NHK announced.
Since its launch in 1957, the show “Kyo no Ryori,” or “Cooking Today,” has presented nearly 46,600 recipes that reflect the spirit of the times, from economic recession to women’s emancipation.
“‘What should I cook for dinner tonight’ is, I think, the eternal question that everyone asks,” the show’s chief producer Mayumi Yanai told reporters during a news conference in Tokyo on Friday. This culinary program, she continued, attempts to “answer that question honestly and resonate with our family audience.”
The first episode in 1957 was dedicated to a Western-style curry with oysters, when one in four Japanese people were suffering from malnutrition.
During the global oil crisis of the 1970s, the show adapted and presented inexpensive recipes to a financially strapped audience.
In the 1980s, as women entered the workforce, the show focused on meals that could be prepared quickly. At this time she also began introducing “men’s meals”.