As I wrote in a previous entry, Japan’s nutritional guidelines specify 30 different foods a day.
If you eat a traditional Japanese diet, this isn’t too hard to do. A classic Japanese meal is a variety of small servings: a simmered dish with carrot, diakon, taro, konnyaku; grilled fish served with ginger; pickled cabbage and cucumbers, a slice or two of sashimi, a salad of hijiki and beans; miso soup with clams; and of course, rice. Right there, you’ve got 14 foods out of the way!
But if you eat a more Western diet, getting up to 30 is really a challenge. Western portions are bigger and there are fewer dishes per meal. Steak, potato, cooked vegetable, bread, butter. That’s only 5…maybe six if you eat the parsley garnish.
But the companies that make bento for convenience stores have hit upon a great idea. The “10 Things” food. It started out with salads. Today I bought a “10 Things” sandwich. It was pretty good for a conbini sando.
What was in it?
- brown rice bread
- chicken
- hijiki
- corn
- carrot
- soy beans
- lettuce
- greens
- milk solids
- mayonnaise
So that, combined with my fruits-and-vegetable juice (7 vegetables and 4 fruits), a container of yogurt and some raisins brings me up to 23 foods for today. 24 if coffee counts as a food.
All I need to do to reach the quota is remember to eat the garnish at dinner tonight…
