Drama titles and posters. It just sometimes drives me mad that the producers of dramas do not put in a better effort into naming and illustrating their creation. I do not know haw many times I was so pleasantly surprised at a drama with an ugly poster(Tsuiraku JK) or un incomprehensible title (Hot Stove League). This one is another example. It should have been called Our Food Journey To Love or something like that

This drama should not have been named Naked Dining because it evoked in viewers concepts and ideas that were nowhere to be found here! The ratings are low here because the majority of watchers were expecting a lot of naked frollicking but there is not even a kiss in this romcom! Naked dining is just a quirky habit the ML has to release the stress: it has no incidence on the plot other than that it is the source behind the first misunderstanding which starts the ball rolling. Immediately afterwards, cooking takes the stage and stays in the center!

ML, Sota, is an intelligent, competent, overworked civil servant who likes eating ramen et midnight, after work, naked. One day he receives a letter from his recently deceased grandmother and goes finally to visit her house. There he meets the local fruit&veg store owner, Mahiro who was close to his grandmother. Sota found the grandmother's notebook with recipes from all over the world (she could not travel due to illness and decided to travel through cooking) and decides to try them all out as a tribute to her. Mahiro helps him cook and they fall in love.

The drama deals with a lot of themes: workplace induced stress, family relationships and the lack thereof, and finally sexual orientation. Sota works too much and the weekend trips to his grandmother's house for cooking lessons are making him realize that there is more to life than just work. He has always worked too much, so much so he had never been in love so when he starts developing feelings for Mahiro, he does not understand them. On the other hand, Mahiro has had a crush on Sota since high school but thinks that Sota is straight so does nothing which confuses poor Sota even more. There are a lot of misunderstandings but when you look at the path that both characters needed to go over it is understandable that they are afraid to say anything in order not to lose the fragile friendly relationship they developed! Slowly, with the accidental help from friends and coworkers, they eventually really talk to each other are meet in the middle of the path.

There are some great support characters in this drama: coworkers and villagers and as per usual in a japanese drama, not an evil character in sight! Even those who might have been turn out to be nice and misunderstood!

The actors were fine and had a correct chemistry. Even though I am not a fan of height difference, it was not too bad since there was no skinship at all involved so it was not too blatant! The cinematography was classical and since it was filmed in autumn or winter, everything was gray and rather depressing: the colour was definitely missing. Hair styling leaves a lot to be desired: practically the complete cast has bad hair!

The drama reminded me a lot of the korean BL Love Tractor but as a much more interesting version especially since the adults were behaving as adults here and not like immature kids in adult bodies as in korean bl! Actually, this is what the korean bl should have been like and it was not!

I enjoyed very much this drama about self discovery and realisation of one's dreams! A lovely drama featuring some mouthwatering dishes!