Author Talk and Signing: Sonoko Sakai, author of Wafu Cooking

Meet Author Sonoko Sakai
In conversation about her newest book, Wafu Cooking: Everyday Recipes with Japanese Style

In partnership with Penguin Random House

Join us for a special talk and signing with bestselling author Sonoko Sakai celebrating the release of her newest book, Wafu Cooking: Everyday Recipes with Japanese Style, a new cookbook that reimagines what Japanese cooking can be. Wafu (literally “Japanese style”) food combines flavors, ingredients and techniques from around the planet with a distinctly Japanese personality, presenting 120-plus original globally-influenced Japanese recipes.

Wafu Cooking captures the cultural exchange between Japan and the rest of the world in dishes that have come to Japan from abroad and been “wafu-ed” to suit local tastes, and in Japanese dishes that are reimagined through an American lens, reflecting the multinational, interconnected way we eat today. Sakai also introduces the essential building blocks of Japanese cuisine—dashi, miso and soy sauce—that can be used to give any dish a wafu twist. A book that reflects as much the author’s own journey—a life spent in New York, Los Angeles, Mexico and elsewhere—as it does the foods of Japan, Wafu Cooking is a unique and thoroughly modern cookbook.

About Sonoko Sakai
Born in New York to Japanese parents, Sakai grew up in San Francisco, Kamakura, Mexico City and Tokyo. She is the author of Japanese Home Cooking, Rice Craft and The Poetical Pursuit of Food. She has worked as a recipe developer, producer, creative director, cooking teacher and lecturer. She is also a grain activist. Sakai lives in Los Angeles and Tehachapi, California with her sculptor husband, Katsuhisa Sakai.

Moderated by Sanaë Lemoine
Sanaë Lemoine is a novelist and cookbook writer. She is the author of the novel The Margot Affair, a New York Times Editors’ Choice, and the co-author of the cookbook Hot Sheet. In 2022, she was a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow. Born to a Japanese mother and French father, she was raised in France and Australia, and now lives in Brooklyn.

Autographs and Book Sales
Attendees of Japan Society’s Sonoko Sakai talk and signing will be able to purchase copies of Wafu Cooking at the event or bring books from home for a signing session following the author’s talk.

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Photos by Rick Poon

Culture & Entertainment programs are generously supported by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, an anonymous donor, and the Sandy Heck Lecture Fund.