Restaurant to Another World (Light Novel) Vol. 1 (Resta… (2025)

2.5

Western Cuisine Nekoya is a restaurant whose doors open to a fantasy world once a week on Saturday, or--as it's so-originally called in the fantasy world--the Day of Satur. Many doors materialize all over the fantasy world, leading characters to Nekoya, and closing behind them for another week when they return home.

Food can bring people together in many ways. A parent cooking a child's favorite meal for their birthday. A restaurant owner who scolds a customer to clean their plate. A beautifully decorated cake and sumptuous meal at a wedding. The circumstances, the people, and the food itself, can change a meal from a forgettable one-off to a lifelong memory.

Nothing like that exists in this book. There are twenty or so chapters in this book, and every single one is structured exactly the same. Character is introduced; they go to Nekoya either as a regular or by accident; they eat something and go into raptures about it. Nobody has any personality or motivations, much less any motivations that are at cross-purposes to each other--they only exist in the book to eat the same food every seven days. They argue sometimes, but only about the merits of their own favorite foods.

Also, the fantasy world is a token world to an embarrassing extreme. Places are named generically: Western Continent, Land of Ocean, the Duchy, etc.--and never rise above being generic. Character races are also generic, the usual parade of dragons and elves and dwarves. Life paths are cadged from literally any D&D campaign: wizard, princess, samurai. There's no hint that the author has read anything but lowest-common-denominator commercialized fantasy, nor that they have put any effort into making their own fantasy world unique.

What I miss most, though, is any sense of connection between the characters. I don't think of this as a cozy story, because these people are so atomized, isolated in their own little world that consists of exactly one food item. They're insulated from each other's fantasy world conflicts by a rule of peace in Nekoya, but that doesn't excuse their not being dimensional enough to be one-dimensional characters. Even the pairs or couples in the story don't feel like pairs or couples, and are more like two identical people with different genders.

The end of the book introduces a new character who becomes a waitress at Nekoya, but she by herself isn't interesting enough to keep me going on to the next installment of this series. I don't recommend this either as a foodie story or as a character piece. It's readable, and is never overtly offensive, but it's also repetitive and bland and has no real atmosphere to it. The front cover is better at conveying atmosphere than anything in the book is. :P

Japanese foodie manga I can recommend are: What Did You Eat Yesterday? by Fumi Yoshinaga, which has lots of homey day-to-day food, and Oishinbo by Tetsu Kariya, with loads of technical detail about traditional Japanese cuisines such as sake and sushi. Although Aria by Kozue Amano isn't a foodie story, it similarly has next to no plot which is what made me think of it as something to recommend instead of this. It makes up for that with a fanciful, immersive and imaginative setting, and a cute cast of characters to explore it.

Restaurant to Another World is the second book I have read that falls into the "Japanese no-stakes, comfort read taking place in a restaurant that describes a lot of food" category. I really liked the concept of this book more than the execution. It was cool to see the fantasy world being built out piece by piece through the introduction of each new patron at the restaurant. Unfortunately, things began to feel repetitive by the end of the volume. It became a drag to get through. I think part of that has to do with the quality of the writing and part of it with trying to keep things too tied together (as far as the characters being introduced goes). I am definitely curious where things will go in the second volume, but also nervous that it will continue to feel like too much of a slog.

Really enjoyed this one! The writing was descriptive enough, that I felt like I was seeing everything that was going on. I really enjoyed this first installment, and can't wait to read the next! Perfect for any foodie out there!

FINALLY! An English translation of the Light Novel Restaurant To Another World. This spawned one of my favourite anime.

This book is a delight. Full of joy.

The Western Restaurant Nekoya is a popular eatery for local salarymen - but it closes on Saturdays for an altogether different type of visitor.

Each chapter focuses upon a menu item ordered by a visitor to Nekoya a restaurant that can only be visited once every 7 days on the day of Satur (Saturday). The visitors are all from another world!

So many wondrous visitors pass through the door, each with their own tale and story.

An Anime was made based upon this series of Light Novels. If you come to this book because of the anime you are going to notice quite a few differences. More characters of even more species and Aletta doesn't show until later on.

Super cute and mindless, but also very repetitive.

This particular light novel reads more like a series of connected short stories. Most of the chapters are from the point of view of a customer — often on their first trip through the door. A typical chapter will include who has found the door, where they were when they found it, and what they end up ordering.

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Aaaah, I love it so much. Just like the anime! I can't wait for the 2nd volume.

Are you stressed out with low bandwidth for complicated plots and angst? Then this relaxing, undemanding book is for you. Each chapter is almost a stand alone story with a new character. The descriptions of delicious recipes made in Japan made me feel comforted and hungry. If you want drama and adventure this isn’t the book you’re looking for.

2 - 2.5 stars.

A bit boring. That is why I kept falling asleep whenever I read it.

I loved the anime and the manga, so I told my self why not try the light novel? And I was right, the light novel didn’t disappoint.

I enjoyed learning about how each food was made, and how significant each dish to each customer. (Can relate because I’m also a foodie). The light novel is a bit different from the manga and the anime. Volume 1 is basically season 1 of the anime, minus Aleta and the black dragon.

Looking forward for volumes 2-5 of the light novel.

A series of separate stories set at the same restaurant, this light novel is a charming ode to culinary delights. Imagine a person from a medieval fantasy land coming to our modern world, and tastes food that is prepared differently from what they are used to, with sauces, and condiments, and different cooking methods; it would be like eating in paradise, right? That's what it is mostly about: the simple delight of discovering extremely tasty food! Each story is about a specific patron, and titled according to their favorite dish (which is also their nickname in the restaurant). The regulars vary from witch princesses, to vegan elves, to Lilliputians, to samurai warriors - all of them coming from another land where there is magic and stuff, and has similar cultures. While the stories aren't arranged chronologically, you still get to see the characters from one story in another, because they are all regulars on the same day that the restaurant is open, and most of the world-building happens slowly over the course of the different stories.

Foodies will love this book - I was blown away with the descriptions of the food; it is the best I have come across, and honestly, made my mouth water and gave me an extreme case of nostalgia for Japanese food (I could almost taste the pork loin cutlet good god!) I mean, you can feel the eagerness with which they wait for every Saturday so that they can go and have their favorite dish. Or in the case of some stories, them being introduced to the food and the way they relish that burst of flavor? I FELT that. Another charming addition was the rituals some of the patrons had - like the lizard people basically having a feast for it, the Lilliputians with their whole protocol to get inside the restaurant and to the human-sized table, the dragon whose greatest treasure is the beef stew, or even the witch princess who devises a refrigerator-like spell to keep her parfaits cold. Some of the stories are cute, like the samurai and the mage from two opposing nations, bickering but sitting down together for the same meal (okonomiyaki).

Coupled with these, are the illustrations - which are of the patrons, mostly, and not the dishes themselves (as I expected) - and they are quite well-done. The overall tone of the book is light and is just about appreciating food, but there is quite a lot of thought put into the world, too, and how such a system would work. Overall, this novel was a delight to read, and if you get hungry while reading it, well, keep some snacks handy!

Received an advance reader copy in exchange for a fair review from Seven Seas, via Edelweiss.

It took me a while to read this one. Just not totally my cup of tea (or bowl of soup if you will). Very vignette-esque in nature, every chapter seemingly focusing on a new customer to Nekoya. You can't even really call the restaurant master the main character since I don't believe he gets a name, nor do you ever see his face, and even in the story you only get a vague sense of him as a character. There's no overarching tale yet, but it does seem like they're setting up a lot of actors for this story so they can go back to them.

I was kind of craving some relationship focus, and it seems like they will do that with certain members of the cast as time goes on. For this volume, the connections are mostly familial or nobility wise. The commoners are much more on the loner side so far, them having their small connections. It'd be nice to see Nekoya become a sort of networking hub for folks. The rules of Nekoya ban fighting, but I don't know that they ban scheming or business deals there.

There's also a sense that Nekoya is helping change the Other World. Some of the characters that eat at Nekoya try to emulate the dishes there or surpass them.

Since so many characters get introduced in such short chapters, and frequently they're referred back to by their dish and not their real names, it's sometimes tough to remember who is whom. To add to the confusion, there are characters in similar stations with similar appearances (light haired princesses; diviners / sorceresses; gruff old men who were warriors once or samurai). Definitely worth a reread, especially if we'll be dealing with some of these characters again in V2.

Overall, not my favorite LN title, but I'll continue with it to see where it goes. The comfort food dishes in this may make your mouth water, and I think it'd be a kind of neat reading challenge to read maybe one chapter a day and then buy that dish each day. At least I'm tempted to do that. xD

Surprisingly common, a subgenre of isekai featuring restaurants or culture catering to otherworlders seems to be quite popular in recent years in Japan. Restaurant to Another World is one such representative and looks to be the first to be published in English.

A delicious read, the book's plot involves a fairly regular diner with a hidden secret; every Saturday it serves residents that reside in another world where fantasy figures like elves, fairies, lizardmen and dwarfs hobnob together, enjoying the best cuisine a typical Japanese dinner offers.

Obviously, the richness and variety of modern Earth cuisine becomes a big fixation amongst them, especially when it's only accessible once a week. This setup does sound worse than it is, but as I read through the book it becomes really quite a delightful read.

What I think that makes this series work really well is the variety of viewpoints we explore as each chapter is a short vignette featuring a specific client of the restaurant and explores their experience in it. This structure is used quite expertly with a huge range from people who stumble upon the restaurant after braving thru a dangerous dungeon to royalty having their weekly parfait fix.

Despite the many various characters, the author expertly crafts a sense of continuity by having many of the other characters make cameo appearances or mentions in each character's story, leaving the reader a very coherent mental image of almost everyone.

It's a huge departure from the usually rather simplistic style of writing that accompanies a lot of isekai works and definitely one does feel the love the author has to his creations in the book.

Definitely one of the must-read books for me in the isekai genre and I'm excitedly looking forward to the next volume when it arrives!

Watched the anime series when it came out and greatly enjoyed it's blend of foodie slice of life / another world genre. So imagine my surprise and joy when it's source novels got an official English language translation and release.

One of the things I truly enjoyed was the description of each type of dish that is enjoyed by all the different visitors from this other world. It is was just amazing to read how each of the visitors are amazed at the level of our food that has evolved due to the melting pot of food that are influenced from various different cultures on a global scale and also the advanced techniques in food processing that has allowed us to produce types of food that qould be unimaginable to fantasy-medieval level era world that they come from.

To mix things up, although it is not a main focus, we also get to see how discovering Nekoya had changed the lives of the visitors. From saving someone from hunger, to changing the food culture of a nation through imitating a dish, or a fateful meeting of one person's love of their life, its just so wonderful how Nekoya enabled people who might never meet each other in their own world could interact in the cosy ambiance of this restaurant.

In short, if you enjoy genres like slice of life with a dash of fantasy trimmings and detailed accounts of delicious food, please give this a read. Just one word of warning though, never read this on an empty stomach if possible because I can guarantee you'll need to stop and get something to eat not long after.

What an absolutely delicious book this is!

Resturant to Another World -henceforth RtAW- is a collection of stories set without another world filled with all sorts of happenings, creatures, adventures, and entities: all of whom enjoy a good meal. Come with an empty stomach: you'll find yourself leaving with a smile and a belly full of happiness and contentment.

RtAW is broken up into short stories or vignettes. Each vignette focuses on a specific food and the eater with a wide range of hot eats and cool treats sure to satisfy anyone who's ever thought, "Yeah, Isekai are cool, but what do people wanna eat in another world?"

I highly recommend devouring this book bite by bite: the stories are connected enough to know that this is all set worried the same other world, but not so connected that you need to read frequently. I read this over a month, and found that it was the perfect way to steadily enjoy this rather thick read. And boy, do I mean thick: this is an almost 400-page read, which is definitely long for a light novel.

Kudos to translator Elliot Ruouga, who really shines and has encouraged my own Translation endeavors. Moreso, kudos to everyone who helped in this process: I really appreciate all the care and thought that went into this first volume. Thanks team!

I wish I could give this volume ten stars: it's certainly earned it. But for now, I'll settle with a well-earned 5/5 and open up Volume 2!

What an interesting book. I am somewhat at a loss for how to write about it. It has basically no plot. I wouldn't call it character driven. It is a collection of vignettes about food that happens to be eaten by the denizens of another world who either know of or stumble across doorways that appear in their world once every seven days on Satur(day). While the various patrons sometimes encounter one another in their world and there are little bits of story for them... there really is no plotline to follow. And yet, I found myself interested and hooked. I wanted to know what the next dish was and who was going to eat it.

I don't know how well that would translate to an anime... and frankly am a bit surprised that I was so interested in just reading these short tales of people/creatures coming to eat at Nekoya.

Verdict: I can totally see how this would not be for everyone. So my only advice is give it a shot and see how you react to it. I for one could hardly put it down.

The book is a series of short stories about one or occasionally more people from a typical medieval fantasy world enjoying their favourite modern dish in a restaurant in Tokyo - a restaurant whose door opens into that fantasy world once a week. It tells how they found that door and a bit on their life set against the backdrop of the restaurant and its chef with a bit of descriptive text on the food eaten. The visitors differ from peasants to princesses, from pixies to dragons, and from priests of light to vampires. Each story following a same basic setup, but being different enough to keep my interest.

All in all, a nice slice-of-many-lives story, quiet and entertaining. If you want action and/or deep plot better look elsewhere ;-)

Note that there is an anime series of the book. Some of the stories will be familiar, others different. Maybe something for a next season? The feel of the light novel and anime are the same though. I enjoyed both.

If your getting ready to read this book definitely grab a snack. I really did like this book and maybe since it took me so long to get through toward the in I wasn't into as much. Never really read a food centered book and this one definitely made me see food in a new way. The descriptions of how flavors work together and all really opened my eyes to the potential of food and cooking. Most of all all the descriptions made me so hungry. lol The chapters are all about different characters coming to the restaurant and after a while it kind of started to get a bit repetitive. Really had to push myself to actually finish it. Over all a really cute and light read!

Episodic tales of a Restaurant that opens up to another world every Saturday. It was cute and fun, but by the end it started feeling repetitive. I think going forward, I'll use future volumes as palate cleansers between other reads. A few chapters at a time. I can't imagine reading another volume start to finish like this initial one.

Also the descriptions of the food have me fiending to dine out. lol

I’m feeling something like a 3.5-star rating for this one. To be honest, I like the anime adaptation of this story better.

Reading about fantasy people figuring out our world’s cuisine is fun to read for the first couple of chapters until the novelty wears out quickly as you keep reading. The anime version of this has two chapters per episode, an easy digest that doesn’t wear off as fast since episodes come out weekly. Plus, it’s easier to guess what things are from the visuals rather than trying to figure out what the “brown liquid” and the “yellow powder” are that they’re describing in the text. Plus, the anime adaptation switches some things around, such as moving Aletta’s introduction much earlier, which helps us have a common element throughout the mini-stories that we can be attached to, rather than the nameless master.

Overall, if you love food anime and/or the anime version of this story, then maybe you’ll like it better than I did. I don’t see myself reading the second volume anytime soon, but I won’t say no to a third season of the anime.

This series has been sitting in my backlog for so long, and I picked it up today mainly due to hunger and work research. It's not quite what I expected. The book has twenty chapters and an extra, each titled after a tasty dish and features a character related to said dish. Since the concept is a restaurant linked to another world, the customers are of varying races. Humans, elves, lizardmen, vampires, you name it. It's a great setup for a meaningful, episodic slice-of-life series, but it's… not.

The main problem with this book is the lack of connectivity and how formulaic the chapters are. Once you're done with a chapter, you're really done with the character involved. They might appear again in another character's story to play a minor role, but that's about it. The pattern is the same for every single chapter too. A character's background is explained, they find the restaurant's door, they eat a meal there, fall in love with the food, and they either leave in satisfaction, become a regular, try to replicate the dish in their world, or all of those at once.

For twenty chapters.

It got so repetitive that by half of the book, not even the mouthwatering descriptions of the food was enough to keep me engaged. I guess it is a light read that can be enjoyed mindlessly so I might pick up the next volume when I'm in the mood for that. Just not for the time being.

4.5/5 stars.
This was an enjoyable read that I could simmer with for a couple of weeks. Each chapter is like a separate episode, so taking your time with this book won't harm in forgetting essential information. To be honest, I'd say it can be underwhelming to have the same amount of information repeated throughout the story, however, it is important if you want to understand the fantastical element (i.e. learning about the different cultures and races of humans and non-humans).
Also, don't read this at night. The author is good at describing food to a point where I went to bed hungry.
Overall, I'm hoping to get my hands on the second book, and definitely recommend to those who are looking for an easy read, regardless of age (but if you're a parent looking for something for your kids, just be aware that there are references to alcohol).

Despues de las LN de Baccano tenia estas pendientes, sobretodo porque el ilustrador es Enami, y aunque sea muy sencillo, su arte me enamora. (Si habeis visto el anime, abarca todas las historias del primer tomo).

La historia se centra en como seres de otro planeta, como no, magico, llegan a traves de una puerta a un restaurante japones que ofrece comida de todo tipo, desde japonesa a occidental. En las historias cortas que acoge nos encontramos con heroes de varios tipos y continentes, y como cada uno descubre a su forma la puerta para llegar al susodicho restaurante y asi saborear platos que jamas habian imaginado. De tal forma que siempre tendran su plato predilecto.

Desde aventureros hasta dragones. Con unas ilustraciones bonitas.

Aunque el libro este en ingles, no es nada complicado y es muy sencillo de leer.

This is a great and very light hearted isekai that I very much enjoyed reading. The chapters are short enough that they can be enjoyed over a lunch break and they offer enough of a glimpse into both the characters and the larger world which they inhabit. There's also enough information about the "master" so that he sounds like a believable person without making him the focus of the tales. I enjoy that the master is central to the stories, he's the anchor that connects everyone, but he isn't the main focus. In fact the main focus is really the fantasy setting which is what I expect in a lightnovel that's framed around the idea of a modern restaurant that carters to fantasy characters. By the end of the book, there's enough of a tease of a larger world and more untold stories that you want to read the second volume. Can't wait to pick up the next one.

Loved this book so much! I adored the anime and when I found out the light novel it is based on was translated, I instantly bought it. It did not disappoint. There is so much more story then what we saw in the anime.

Western Restaurant Nekoya is a Japanese eatery that every Saturday, day of Satur, the door connects to all over a fantasy world. Each chapter focuses on a different food loved by all manner of fantasy creatures and races. Essentially it is a novel about fantasy world character foodies.

If you like cute calm fantasy with lots of descriptions of food, this is the book for you. I can't wait to read the next one. ☺

This was my first "Light Novel" and I enjoyed it a lot more than I expected! But that might also be due to my loving the anime so much. I think other readers who enjoy the anime will like the chance to find out more details and information about the fantasy patrons that visit Nekoya. AND the bonus is that we also get to see more stories that aren't in the anime! (I kind of wish they would make another season since each story is roughly half a 30-minute episode, but that's not my call.)

Plus, there's also black and white pictures interspersed throughout the book featuring both old and new characters. Definitely worth the read!

If there is a cooking/food focused book that nails food descriptions better, I don't know it.

Given the structure of this novel, each chapter functioning as its own standalone story set in this mysterious restaurant, I enjoyed reading one or two chapters before bed every so often. Letting me really take my time and enjoy it (not that I needed to, I think volume 4 just released in English).

I think about half of the chapters in this book were adapted for the anime, which I saw prior to this. But the book still plenty new to offer. This is the quintessential relaxation read (though I wouldn't dare to try it on an empty stomach). I look forward to the next.

Looking for another food manga series to read.
This "light novel" isn't gonna work.
B&W!
Food not that interesting (tofu steak and beef stew???).
And this one has the near ubiquitous manga Japanese girl - big eyes, looks 14 but has the body of a 22 year old model (which we get to see bits of, but not all of, in the story). Sophomoric.
I do have the 2 DVD anime set from the local PL - I doubt if I will watch it all, but will give a few episodes a watch.
Both the DVD and this book was through the ILL service at my local PL. Our statewide library ststem does not have any other of the total of 6 manga/light novel titles.
2 out of 5 - it was OK.

Pleasant light novel that would interest most foodies out there. Nothing offensive or objectionable, true. But, also not much tension or thrills - no romance, either. Chef of the Western Restaurant Nekoya (which he inherited from his grandfather) and Aletta, the orphaned demon girl from the other world are the two main characters. Each chapter highlights a different dish and the "other world" customer who desires it. Elves, a dragon, lizard people, etc. all visit the restaurant from the fantasy world on the other side of the restaurant's door, but only on Saturdays (the day of Satur).
Very intriguing . . . I am interested in seeing where this series goes from here.