Ill informed thoughts on "the best diet in the world"

Having recently been in Japan and experienced their cuisine for a little under 3 weeks I've been wondering about it. The stats show that the Japanese have the longest life expectancy of any people and I've seen in several places that this is attributed to their diet (although I haven't seen comparable statistics for Japanese people who eat a "westernized" diet, if somebody knows of these then that would be most helpful to rule out the possibility of this life expectancy being genetic and not due to diet) 

As far as I experienced it (and this was confirmed by my friend who has lived in Japan for two years) they seem to rely on rice and miso as two staples and then have either raw foods, such as fish but occasionally chicken and beef, or deep fried foods, usually the same meats. There were hardly and vegetables, those that were there tended to be pickled, and I had almost zero fruit in my time.

Can anybody offer an explanation as to how this constitutes a good diet? My understanding so far has been that we need lots of vegetables for nutrients and antioxidants etc to maintain optimal health (possibly this isn't optimal for longevity though?) but these appear to be severely lacking.

Is anyone able to explain this apparant contradiction to me? (if indeed there is even a contradiction here or am I just missing something/actually being very ignorant as to the typical Japanese diet)

cheers

I know little about the japanese diet but can confirm that you can take a map of macro nutrients (40,40,20), just for the sake of an example and that can look very different when you change the protein, carb and fat sources.

from what i've gathered of what constitutes a healthy diet is one that emphasizes or exposes you to a range of antioxidants and also one that protects you from insulin sensitivity via frequent balanced meals.

apart from that, i can impart much wisdom here because quite honestly, im still wrapping my head around the basics and those two concepts are what seems to me to be the core of adequate nutrition, to my current level of understanding.

Were you living with Japanese people or just eating out? When I ate out in Japan during my month experience there, there was a lack of vegetables and fruit.

My fiance is 1/2 Japanese and grew up every summer in Japan. Her experience and mine is that you get plenty of vegetables and fruit with the family. If you didn't maybe that family isn't as healthy? I am not sure. I did not have the same experience as you did though.

Prometheus

True I was mostly eating out in restaurants or buying bento! Would you mind giving me a rough outline of what a typical days food would involve? 

KeilaniG 

Thanks for the input I always try and look too deeply into diet and forget that usually it's best to keep it simple and just get the basics right, the rest tends to take care of itself

spinelli said:

Prometheus

True I was mostly eating out in restaurants or buying bento! Would you mind giving me a rough outline of what a typical days food would involve? 

 

KeilaniG 

 

Thanks for the input I always try and look too deeply into diet and forget that usually it's best to keep it simple and just get the basics right, the rest tends to take care of itself

Sorry on the late reply! I haven't checked this in a while.

Yeah, it is really true. Really, the best diet is one that has everything (possibly even saturated fat) in moderation. Diversity is key as well. As for the typical diet of the Japanese, I can only comment on the family I was with, and I was only eating at home with them for a short time; there must be better resources than me~. Honestly, I can only really describe the breakfast as everything else would be really complicated for me to explain. Even my gf, who grew up partially in Japan would have a hard time explaining it, as she doesn't know all the English words for the Japanese ones.

A lot of Japanese food (like Korean, but more diverse) is also fermented and pickeled too.

For breakfast: natto, seaweed sheets, small bowl of rice, salad, maybe an extra egg (as the natto we ate needed an egg added already). I had tea too.

Keep in mind as well, that the Japanese are beginning to see huge influxes of processed foods into their diet as well. My gf's mom grew up after WWII, and talks about how local foods were all they had, and diversity in food was not much. My gf's mother talks about how my gf's older brother (18 years older) has a much more limited Japanese food palate compared to my gf, since 20 years ago regional foods were not moved around as much.

Even today, one of our Japanese friends was talking about how she grew up in an area near Tokyo, moved to another area and hosted a dinner. People commented (in a passive-aggressive way of an Asian sort) how she didn't serve the appropriate side-dishes with the meal (since she provided her native Japanese region's dishes, and not theirs).

Good luck though~.

I have lived in Tokyo for 4 years and here is my take:

- the healthcare system is one of the best in the world

- poverty is low

- unemployment is low (though crap jobs are plenty)

- education levels are high

- Japanese people are more obsessed with health and cleanliness than other developped country

- most people under eat (calorie restriction extends lifespan)

All this would explain a longer life expectency.

But all you guys need is to check the WHO numbers on cancer and diabetes, they are of the same order of magnitude than in the US.

And I won't go into more offending topics that may be influenced by their nutrition unless asked for it

I have been living in Japan for 11+ years and generally the eating habits in big cities like Tokyo and the countryside are totally different. Of course there are people that eat healthy in the cities too, but the tendency is to eat more fast food (be it Western junk food or for example, of Chinese origin like noodles, etc. )

In the countryside they do eat a lot of vegetables in ALL meals, including breakfast, and you can also count in several kinds of seaweed. The statistics of higher longevity was obtained in the southern islands, mostly Okinawa, and they were (don't know if they still keep that way) more conservative to traditional eating and didn't adopt much junk food. Many attribute their highest longevity to the popular "fruit" (often taken as a vegetable) Goya or Bitter Melon/Bitter Gourd. You can check in the internet and see the several benefits it has.

At the beginning of this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM, Dr. Lustig, an expert on sugar, talks briefly right at the beginning of this lecture ,saying what the Atkins diet and the Japanese diet have in common: they both exclude fructose. That would be another healthy point in their diets. You can clearly see that the Japanese who follow a more traditional diet (even though consuming starchy carbs, usually from rice) are more lean and healthy. Charles Poliquin also said Asians usually are more carb tolerant, I don't know if that's true.