I received this book as a gift from my Sister-in-law, a Nisei herself. After about 10 years, she got a copy for herself and her mother, because she realized that she had never seen a better book on Japanese cooking. Her comment was that it had all the food that her family really fixed growing up, but that the recipes were in English measurements (i.e. cups, teaspoons, etc.), which made following the recipes much more convenient to actually use. Before, she and her mother used to laboriously convert the Japanese measurements to English ones, which was a pain. Besides trying all kinds of noodle recipes, I have used this book to make really good vinegared-rice sushi, which is always a huge hit at parties; everyone is just ga-ga; the presentation is just beautiful, truly artistic. The food is also very low fat and healthy, lots of fish. I think if I fed my family this cuisine for one month, we'd lose some serious weight. Japanese cooking is not really as difficult as you might think. There is a relatively simple cast of ingredients and untensils, most of which can be easily obtained at a Japanese grocery store in any good-sized US city. Also, it's quite possible to order Japanese specialty products on the Internet, for e.g at ethnicgrocer.com