When a man who looks straight out of a fantasy novel stumbles into her home, chef Yujeong sends him packing—but not before feeding him. After all, he was hungry, and a chef should never ignore a guy in need of grub. But the man comes back day after day, with one request for Yujeong: “Help me save my world!” Fateful words that send this humble chef on an adventure for the ages!

The Savior's Recipes has a story and art by Lee Ayoung, SongAppi, and The Queen/StoryZAK. English localization by TAPAS ENTERTAINMENT. Published by TAPAS ENTERTAINMENT. Rated T.

Erica Friedman
Rating:

A woman finds an intruder in her house from another world who begs her to save his world. When she finally decides to do so, Yujeong finds herself transported to a deserted island. Forced to survive with relatively minimal resources, Yujeong changes. Food, which had been her comfort and joy as a chef, is now a necessity. The Savior's Recipes starts hard; I won't lie to you. Called a “savior” by her intruder, Yujeong has no cheat skills, no goddess who gives her blessings, no stats, just her innate desire to live and the ability to cook.

Rescued by a merchant vessel, Yujeong finds herself a human among other races who don't care for humans, illiterate, innumerate, and in a world where food is terrible. Slowly, through her cooking, Yujeong transforms the people and town around her. It's slow going, but by the end of the extant chapters, we can see that Yujeong will, eventually, be this world's savior.

But wow, that's open. It was rough.

The art here is as much a celebration of Korean food as it is a story, with many panels being dedicated to lovely ingredients being combined in ways that are visually expressed as sparkling, shiny, and glistening. Do not read this while hungry, or detailed descriptions of bosom will have your stomach growling (even more so if you've had bosom, because it is so so good.)

Characters are a bit on the thin side; we're not given more than a cursory backstory for Yujeong's situation, and even less for characters in the new world, so you'll be taking this story pretty much superficially as it is presented to you, learning about the world in the small doses Yujeong does.

It's a slow and steady story, with additional worldbuilding parsed out. Yujeong has decent people around her…so one is hopeful that she will indeed be the world's savior, with food.

Rebecca Silverman
Rating:

This may be the most uneven title I've read this time around. The Savior's Recipes has an interesting concept and fantastic worldbuilding, but those are backed by art that is consistently awkward and a plot that moves too slowly. It takes what feels like a ridiculously long time for heroine Yujeong to get to Nimo's world, testing the readers' patience with endless scenes of the two of them in her sparse Korean apartment. Yujeong's temper seems to always be on the verge of flaring while Nimo spends most of his time looking like a puppy that expects to be kicked. It's not a particularly fun dynamic, and the claustrophobic confines of the setting don't do much to back up the bits of interesting worldbuilding we get from Nimo about his home.

Then there's the art. While Nimo generally looks okay, possibly because his clothing covers most of his body, Yujeong is all weird proportions and strange angles. Her head is consistently too big and round for her body, and the less said about her feet and hips, the better. But the food - the food is lovingly rendered, from the way eggs cling to a whisk to the bubbles on boiling porridge. Arguably, in a series with “recipes” in the title, this is the more important place for the artwork to shine. I might be more forgiving if Yujeong was drawn a bit better.

So why is this scored as highly as it is? Because once you get past the drag of the opening five-odd chapters, the story kicks into, if not “high gear” precisely, then at least a higher one. All Yujeong has is her cooking skills – unlike most other isekai protagonists, she's otherwise not gifted or special in any way. If she wasn't rescued shortly after arriving through her shoe closet (much less spacious than those Narnia kids got), she would be dead. She's a “savior” in name only, at least thus far, and that ups the ante significantly.

If you can get through the first chapters, I think this will be worth reading in its entirety. (Assuming the art isn't a problem for you.) Those really are a slog, but the combination of interesting worldbuilding, attractive food, and some clear differences from its genre siblings do a lot to ameliorate the drag of early chapters.