【10th Round】We Ask Amazon Rainforest Chef Mr. Tetsuo Ota What Travel Will Look Like in 5 Years

The New Buds of Tourism, Exploring the Shape and Future of Tourism Five Years Ahead

Mr. Ota has had a wide variety of experiences as an Amazon rainforest chef. What’s the world he’s arrived at through food?

Today’s column focuses on knowing and pinpointing changes in future tourism and travel trends and brings an expertise from specialist outside of the travel industry to share their thoughts. We’re joined by Mr. Tetsuo Ota, a chef who imports Amazon rainforest cacao, runs restaurants, make sweets and has plenty of other experiences in his field as well.

Mr. Tetsuo Ota

　
Mr. Tetsuo Ota is from Hakuba, Nagano prefecture, born in 1980. He has over 10 years of experience working in Italy, Spain and Peru as a chef, coming back to Japan in 2015. In Italy, he worked at a Michelin-starred restaurant, served as a private chef for well-to-do ladies in Milan, and worked at the hottest pizza restaurant. In Spain he worked at “El Bulli,” and in Peru, “Astrid y Gastón,” among others. Aside from working as a chef, he’s currently work on getting more Amazon rainforest cacao imported into Japan.
　

Meeting People From All The World Started the International Journey

　
Explorer: Please tell us about your childhood, before you wanted to become a chef.
　
Mr. Ota: I was born in Hakuba, Nagano prefecture and my family operated an inn. There were world mountain bike tournaments in the summer, and the Olympics in the winter. Many athletes from around the world would stay with us. When the Olympics ended, I just graduated from high school. That was catalyst that made me want to travel the world. I liked the vibe Europeans had so I wanted to go to France or Italy. In the end, a guest from Italy recommended me their country and so I decided to go there. Since my childhood, I enjoyed art and classical music and maybe that influenced my decision. I liked trying out food at various restaurants since I was a child. I know it’s not a mainstream thing, but when I was in middle school or high school, I went to Tokyo often and tried different restaurants, patisseries, and chocolatiers. That was my hobby. And as a result of that, I referenced books that I brought from Japan and went to various restaurants after I arrived in Italy.
　
Explorer: You went to Italy and started out at a language school. What was the catalyst that launched your career into becoming a chef?
　
Mr. Ota: The language school I was attending at the time had a class where we had to talk about where we went to during the weekend in Italian. I would go to these fancy restaurants that not even the teachers would go to and talk about how the traditional Milan cutlet has been interpretated into a new modern style and not just say it tasted good. The teachers and the students were shocked at my responses (laughs). The principal heard my presentations and suggested to me to work at a restaurant, as I would get meals and be satisfied with everything. That’s when I decided to enter the world of the restaurant. I’d like to recreate the flavors I would taste at the restaurants I went to. Since I was a child, I’d look at recipe books and liked to make food as well. It makes me happy to see the joy on people’s faces when they try something I’ve made too.
　
Explorer: Did you spend time in Italy for a while after that to train?
　
Mr. Ota: People advised me that I would learn more if I learned the basics of cooking before I developed my own sense of style and then train in Italy. So, I went back to Japan and studied cooking. I went back to Italy when I was around 23 years old. There was a restaurant I wanted to work at in Italy, so I called them from a telephone booth in Dogenzaka saying, “I’d like to work there…” (laughs). When I think of it now, I’m surprised how receptive they were.

　

Adaptability and an Unwavering Bud Leads to the Path of Becoming an Amazon Rainforest Chef

　
Explorer: You currently import Amazon rainforest cacao, run restaurants and make desserts. How did you arrive to these three different jobs from your experience in Italy?
　
Mr. Ota: Let’s see. There were many opportunities to make desserts at the restaurant I worked. After I finished my training in Italy, I wanted to see the cutting-edge of the world, so I talked to my friends in Italy about this. They suggested to me to try Spain since it’s so interesting nowadays. So, I went past Nice and Provence in France and straight to Catalonia in Spain by car. When I tried one bite of the food in a Spanish restaurant, I felt like the country was calling me and decided to move there at that moment. I thought about my next location to train and realized I have a lot of friends from Central and South America who speak Spanish. I would often hear about those places and the latest cutting-edge food as well. With that, I developed an interest in Central and South America after that. At first, I wanted to go to Brazil but hear Peru was interesting and thus went there instead.
　
Explorer: Listening to your story, it seems like you were blessed with all these connections. You’re proactive and have ambitions. What did you keep in mind when you were doing all of this?
　
Mr. Ota: I’m a very positive thinker. It’s only downhill when you’re surrounded by negative thoughts. There are many people in this world who don’t receive any light from the sun and suffer through strife. I was living for five years with someone from Ukraine at the time and when I heard their heroic story about how they came to Italy, I thought to myself that Japan is a blessed country. Those people always have a positive outlook. It all depends on if you’re able to adapt or not to survive overseas. If you can’t, you’ll go back home, but if you can, you’ll pave a path for yourself. I believe I naturally started to live my life like that. Opportunities come fairly to everyone. In your life there might be a big opportunity that comes along, or you might be satisfied with the little ones. I’m the type to be satisfied with the little opportunities. I’ll always choose the things I believe to be good in this one life I have, not waiting for praise from others. In that way, always having an unwavering bud might be very important.
　
Explorer: Adaptability is a very good word here. We hear you’re now located in Karuizawa.
　
Mr. Ota: Nagano prefecture is full nature and has plenty of space. I wanted to work in a place that was spacious and comfortable. That doesn’t mean that it has to be this place or anything. I believe I can live and work anywhere so I cherish these connections. When I saw the backside to the raw materials for Amazon rainforest cacao, it was a time when chefs couldn’t just make food. So, I thought there could be something I can do in my own way. That’s how I ended up working with cacao chocolate. I have over 2,000 farmers now, and I must continue to support their futures. So, I’m not fussed about making only food but also desserts. I’m happy if I can continue expressing myself through my work. I’m balancing out my three jobs: importing cacao, a chef, and making desserts. I hope can I continue to ride this wave.

　

Food is One Communication Tool, It Tells a Truth You See With Your Own Eyes

　
Explorer: What have you gained and what is now visible to you having these experiences in the culinary world?
　
Mr. Ota: Even if you don’t know an allegory to it, the word “delicious” is used throughout the world. The food world is very easy to enter in any country. There are a lot of things you can see through food. For example, food and the culture behind religion is deeply connected. Why do people eat certain foods on certain days, and why are people prohibited from eating certain foods? Those questions form a cultural background of food that you can see. Different people feel different things taste good. I’ve done research on the length of intestines, teeth and the differences in general composition of the body having taken CT scans. Using food as a tool of communication, you can learn about the origins of someone and how their food culture was born.
　

A Place Where You Can Feel How Travel Changes Through Time

　
Explorer: You believe that food is one communication tool. What role do you think travel plays as you run your businesses?
　
Mr. Ota: It is my job to introduce people to new things. Travel is a way for me to input new information. After coming back to Japan, I believe talking about things with everyone and making new things are ways I achieve output. There’s always something new to discover at places I’ve visited before, I feel like it’s seeing the change of time happen. For Italy, Milan has changed tremendously from 10 years ago. The old town has disappeared, and new commercial facilities have taken its place. Old dessert shops remain the same appearance-wise, but the packages have become more modern. Travel for me is thinking about why things have to be the way they are and why 300-year-old stores never modernized with the times. Travel for me is to see things with my own eyes and to understand how a place changes in five to 10 years and how the people living there also change. I have a lot of opportunities to go to the Amazon rainforest, so I take notes of how forests, environments, and the earth are changing through travel. It isn’t only about the people.
　
Explorer: We can now experience a place through social media and other ways without having to go there ourselves.
　
Mr. Ota: Nothing beats looking at the details carefully. You can look at videos and read about what authentic Italian food is to talk about it, but the weight of the words of someone who’s experienced it in real life versus those who haven’t is completely different. I will sometimes talk to children, and I want to talk about those real-life experiences in the most detailed way possible. By doing that, I’m able to tell the reality and satisfy myself in what I’m saying too. I have a lot of built-up passion to teach people things. Many people whom I admire also do the same thing, so I’d like to follow in their footsteps.

The “Bud” We Found in this Exploration

We saw a lot in those exploration; what really surprised was Mr. Ota’s adaptability. He possesses an unwavering bud that continues to pursue the things he needs to do through food, and that’s why he’s able to adapt to any environment and time – to spread his wings to fly. “Food” is a keyword to the world and brings relief to the world’s problem and the stories behind them and it connects everything in this world.