Are you eating right?
Jun. 27th, 2006 07:59 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
spacealien_vampI've been seeing the Japanese Food Balance Guide (the equivalent of the Food Pyramid) on posters and such all around recently, so I thought I'd post a link for others to check out.
At the very top of the image with the exercising figure is a glass labeled "water/tea."
Then there's the carbohydrate group, or, as you may see from the picture, "bread, rice, noodles...more rice." Note that there is no cereal in the picture. This is because the Japanese don't eat cereal. Well...unless you count the Corn Flakes in the ice cream sundaes...
The next category down is the vegetable group. Note how much larger this is compared to the US version.
Next, the protein group, with fish and tofu in the middle.
Finally, the dairy and fruit groups get to share the very tip of the pyramid. Why is the fruit group so tiny? I don't know, but it may have something to do with how doggone expensive fruit is here. When one apple costs $3.50, you don't eat very many of them.
In contrast with the recommendations of the food balance guide, however, I've been checking out the KitKat group. The wild and wacky flavors this season include Fruit Parfait, French Bretagne Milk, and 宇治金時 (green tea with sweet red beans). I even saw an official Universal Studios Japan flavor for Tanabata, which is a swirl of brown and white chocolate designed to look like the Milky Way (the key feature of the Tanabata festival).
Too bad chocolate melts so fast here in the summer...
At the very top of the image with the exercising figure is a glass labeled "water/tea."
Then there's the carbohydrate group, or, as you may see from the picture, "bread, rice, noodles...more rice." Note that there is no cereal in the picture. This is because the Japanese don't eat cereal. Well...unless you count the Corn Flakes in the ice cream sundaes...
The next category down is the vegetable group. Note how much larger this is compared to the US version.
Next, the protein group, with fish and tofu in the middle.
Finally, the dairy and fruit groups get to share the very tip of the pyramid. Why is the fruit group so tiny? I don't know, but it may have something to do with how doggone expensive fruit is here. When one apple costs $3.50, you don't eat very many of them.
In contrast with the recommendations of the food balance guide, however, I've been checking out the KitKat group. The wild and wacky flavors this season include Fruit Parfait, French Bretagne Milk, and 宇治金時 (green tea with sweet red beans). I even saw an official Universal Studios Japan flavor for Tanabata, which is a swirl of brown and white chocolate designed to look like the Milky Way (the key feature of the Tanabata festival).
Too bad chocolate melts so fast here in the summer...
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no subject
Date: 2006-06-26 11:15 pm (UTC)I had a college friend in England whose mother very nearly threatened to stop her allowance when she found out that her daughter was wasting money buying (shock!) GREEN PEPPERS. You would've thought she was living on nothing but asparagus and strawberries in wintertime.
(And yeah, green peppers really were that expensive. I used to suck it up and buy them anyway, because they were practically the only non-brown vegetable to be had in winter.)
I tried the Fruit Parfait kitkat after I got home, and I thought it was ick, but that's probably because I carried it in my pocket too long.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-27 06:38 am (UTC)<g> It really is something.
(And yeah, green peppers really were that expensive. I used to suck it up and buy them anyway, because they were practically the only non-brown vegetable to be had in winter.)
I'm really bad about eating vegetables. I know I should eat more, but I just don't like most of them.
I tried the Fruit Parfait kitkat after I got home, and I thought it was ick, but that's probably because I carried it in my pocket too long.
They taste a little too much of banana for them to be my favorite, but they're not all that bad.
The sakura ones they had in the spring were great. I think I like those the best of the ones I've tried so far.
I haven't tried the green tea/sweet bean ones yet, but I have a bag of them chilling in my refrigerator. (They're supposed to be imitating a flavor of shaved ice, so the package says to keep it cold.)
no subject
Date: 2006-06-27 12:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-27 06:40 am (UTC)I did notice that it's lacking the "salt/sugar/fat" group that's at the top of the US pyramid. That's cutting out half my diet right there...
no subject
Date: 2006-06-29 05:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-06-29 11:05 pm (UTC)