Restaurant to Another World (Isekai Shokudō) is the anime equivalent of coming home on a cold night, taking off your shoes, and having someone hand you a steaming bowl of your favorite comfort food while telling you everything is going to be okay. Produced by Silver Link across two perfect seasons (2017 and 2021, 12 episodes each), this gentle fantasy slice-of-life series takes the isekai genre, strips away all the fighting, power fantasies, and drama, and replaces it with one simple premise: once a week, a humble Tokyo diner opens its doors to another world, and everyone who walks through just wants to eat good food.
The setting is pure genius. Nekoya, or “Western Restaurant Nekoya,” is a completely ordinary basement restaurant in modern Japan that has been in business for decades. Every Saturday, its front door mysteriously connects to random locations across a fantasy world filled with dragons, demons, elves, beastmen, and mages. A bell rings, the “Open” sign flips, and creatures who have never seen a fork in their lives step inside for the best meal they’ll ever have in their thousand-year lives.
There is no chosen one. No evil overlord. No world-ending threat. The only stakes are whether the pudding will set in time and if the master has enough beef for everyone’s steak donburi.
The master himself, an unassuming middle-aged chef with a glorious mustache, never asks questions. Dragon god who can destroy mountains? Welcome. Demon queen who hasn’t eaten in centuries? Here’s your usual table. Lion-eared knight who crossed a desert for curry? Extra spicy, coming right up. He just cooks, serves with a smile, and watches centuries-old grudges melt away over a plate of tonkatsu.
Each episode follows a simple, perfect formula: a new customer from the fantasy world discovers the door, walks in terrified or skeptical, orders something they’ve never seen before, takes one bite, and has their entire existence rearranged by the power of minced meat cutlet or tofu hamburger steak. The reactions are pure bliss. Red, the ancient dragon who hoards gold, becomes a sobbing mess over pudding parfait. Aletta, the broke demon girl who starts working weekends as a waitress, cries actual tears the first time she tastes curry rice. Kuro the death dragon orders forty servings of pork cutlet and declares it worth more than entire kingdoms.
Season one is cozy perfection. Season two somehow gets even cozier by bringing back old favorites and introducing new ones: a mermaid who only eats raw fish until she tries grilled eel, a pair of rival treasure hunters who bond over omurice, a vampire queen who hasn’t tasted food in eight hundred years and nearly faints from carbonara. The animation is warm and inviting, with food scenes animated with the kind of love usually reserved for shonen fight sequences. Every dish glistens. Every bite looks like it could cure depression.
The voice acting is phenomenal. Junichi Suwabe as the master radiates calm grandpa energy that makes you want to hug your screen. Saori Ōnishi as Aletta delivers some of the most genuine “this is the best thing I’ve ever eaten” reactions in anime history. Even the background chatter of fantasy patrons feels lived-in and real.
There is no plot in the traditional sense, and that’s the entire point. This is a world where a plate of teriyaki chicken can end wars, where a demon general and a holy priestess share a table and realize they both love croquettes, where a dragon would rather die than miss Saturday because the master promised to try making mont blanc this week.
The final episodes of season two deliver quiet, perfect payoffs. Aletta gets to go home and share curry with her little sister. Red finally tries the legendary “cheesecake” she’s been hearing about for decades. The master closes up shop one last time, flips the sign to “Closed,” and you realize you’ve been smiling with tears in your eyes for twenty-four episodes straight.
Final Score: 9.8/10 – Peak comfort food anime
Restaurant to Another World is proof that sometimes the most powerful stories aren’t about saving the world. They’re about feeding it.
In a medium full of explosions, trauma, and world-ending stakes, this show dares to ask a simple question: what if everyone just sat down and had a nice meal together?
The answer is the coziest, most soul-healing experience you’ll ever have in anime.
Stream both seasons legally on Crunchyroll.
Bring tissues. And maybe don’t watch on an empty stomach.
You’ll never look at minced meat cutlet the same way again.
Welcome to Nekoya.
The door is always open on Saturday.
Play
Season 1
Season 2