Rokusaburo Michiba facts for kids

Rokusaburo Michiba (道場 六三郎, Michiba Rokusaburō, born 3 January 1931) is a Japanese cuisine chef best known as the first Japanese Iron Chef on the television series Iron Chef. He was on the show from its inception in 1993 until his retirement on his 65th birthday, January 3, 1996.

Career as Iron Chef

First course of a tasting menu offered at https://rokusantei.jp/ Ginza Rokusan-tei

Although Michiba was a Japanese chef, he was well known for his philosophy of incorporating non-Japanese traditional elements into his dishes. Michiba was given foie gras as a theme ingredient in his first battle against Yousei Kobayakawa (French cuisine trained), which Michiba won.

Michiba was also known for "Inochi no Dashi" (命の出汁, いのちのだし or "Broth of Vigor"), a combination of katsuobushi, skipjack tuna shavings and edible kelp (konbu), which he used during almost every battle.

Awards and Records

Despite being the most senior of the Iron Chefs, he still retains the impressive Kitchen Stadium record for the most dishes prepared in a single battle: eight.

Hobbies

Michiba was also interested in calligraphy, often using the beginning of a battle to write a menu. However, he did lose multiple battles because he forgot to write the menu, or wrote it at last moments. In a particular episode where his sous-chef challenged Iron Chef Masaharu Morimoto, Michiba justified that he wrote from his (Morimoto's) menu to clarify what he wanted to present, and to inform his assistants so that they can know which ingredients to gather and prepare. Several challengers had also written out their menus during their battle.

Illness and Retirement

Michiba's tenure was interrupted by an illness in mid-1995 that briefly hospitalized him, and afterwards, he began getting tired from the stress of appearing on the show and running his three restaurants: Poisson Rokusaburo in Akasaka, and Ginza Rokusan-tei and Kaishoku-Michiba in Ginza. Addition of a 4th Judge only worsened the Overtime Battles.

According to Takeshi Kaga, after his decision to retire, Rokusaburo Michiba vowed to recruit his successor himself. The show continued with just French Iron Chef Hiroyuki Sakai and Chinese Iron Chef Chen Kenichi for two months. Koumei Nakamura was appointed as his successor. Initially, Nakamura refused, but later on, he accepted. Nakamura's first battle was on March 1, 1996, against French chef Kiyoshi Suzuki. During the introduction of the theme ingredient of the day, Chairman Kaga stated that he wanted to choose foie gras because he wanted to re-create partially Michiba's first victory by using the same ingredient.

Michiba was also extremely supportive of Nakamura's successor, Masaharu Morimoto, which also frequently used non-Japanese traditional ingredients. The show often referred to the relationship between Michiba and Morimoto as that between master and student, especially after an episode where Michiba flew to New York to visit Morimoto's restaurant, Nobu. Before his New York battle with chef Bobby Flay, Michiba gave Morimoto a large box of Katsuobushi flakes with a hand-calligraphed message: "respect the old but seek out the new."

Subsequent appearances

Michiba made appearances throughout the 2012 revival ("Ryouri no Tetsujin Dream Match! World Iron Chef Live Battle Special") of Iron Chef through interviews with former assistant Kenichi Miyanaga, a seat on the tasting panel, and as a competitor against new Iron Chef Jun Kurogi.

Iron Chef tie-in events

In 2017, Michiba participated in an Iron Chefs All Star Dinner event in Australia’s Sydney Opera House.

Career outside Iron Chef

Michiba was a successful restaurateur outside of the Iron Chef show, operating several restaurants across Japan. The most notable of these is Kaishoku Machiba in the upscale Ginza district of Tokyo. As of 2022, Michiba was still running these restaurants at the age of 91.

Manga

The manga series Kandō Ō Retsuden featured a story about Michiba in volume 2, named "Michiba Rokusaburō Monogatari". It was Compiled by Yasuo Negishi, as illustrated by Yoshihiro Takahashi.