Years ago when I was living in Japan, I was struck by the sheer number of cooking shows on TV. I couldn't for the life of me understand why every other show was a celebrity cook-off, cooking show, or the like. One day, however, I was reading the Japan Times when I came upon an explanation:

Japan seems to have a lot of cooking programs on TV. Why do you think that is?

There are 90 cooking programs a week, but that is not because people are especially interested. The producers don't have much money anymore and it doesn't cost much to create a cooking program, for which they can get fairly good viewing figures. However, that's just because there is nothing else worth watching — on variety programs you see the same people doing and saying the same stupid things. I don't think there is any other country that airs cooking programs morning, noon and night even on nonspecialist channels.

Hattori first became a household name in Japan after he started to appear as a commentator on the "cooking battle" TV program "Ryori no Tetsujin (Iron Chef)." The enormously popular show ran from 1993 to 1999 and created such a stir that it was screened, suitably dubbed, on U.S. TV before a U.S.-made version, titled "Iron Chef," took over in 2001.