Buy Toriko, Vol. 1
by Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro. Published by Viz Media. 208 pages. 2010. $9.99.
Enter a world where gourmet food is quite prized, and if you can eat the most unique foods, then what is all worth living for is the satisfaction of fulfilling your taste buds. Since the world is suppose to be about foods, and gourmet, notice all the unique animals and fruits that there is.
Hunters exist to seek out rare ingredients for chefs to prepare, and the namesake of this manga is Toriko, one of the best hunters that there is in the world. He is ranked to being known as one of the four kings. Similar to all shonen jump manga leads, he has a bottomless appetite, and a simple ambition of creating his ideal menu. He only kills what he eats, so expect lots of action scenes as well as powering up scenes. Though when Toriko powers up, definitely reminds me of a certain saiyans.
One thing that cracks me up is that Toriko lives in a Hansel and Gretel house, that attracts. So he can definitely have his cake and eat it too, although I personally imagine that I will get a stomach ache from the sweets. Definitely reminding me of Gintoki from Gintama. Toriko, being that it is a shonen title is filled with muscular manly man. (Yum!) Also if you have read Hunter x Hunter, this entire series is centered around Gon’s second exam stage.. so this take Gourmet hunting to another level.
Personally I don’t believe that there are enough manga translated in English about foods, and I know that there is a huge section of manga that is devoted to talking about food in Japanese. So if you are a regular reader for Shonen Jump manga, and can’t seem to get enough of food manga like Oishinbo or Yakitate!! Japan this is a manga for you to check out. There are ten volumes out in Japanese, and at this time only two volumes out in English.