This is somewhat irrelevant to nutrition but I’ll put it up here anyways:
The light blue part with dots is female and the dark green portion represents male in percentages. We need more female hackers!
I gave a talk at Penguicon on Geeks and Nutrition this weekend. I’ll be uploading the results from the survey and my comments.
Here’s a sneak preview of the top 13 countries of participants. There were 747 participants from 54 countries:
It seems like that the easiest ways to find vegetarian friendly restaurants in Japan would be to look for macrobiotics places. It is true that some microbiotic recipes include meat and fish, most places have pretty good selections for vegetarians.
Since I’ll be spending most of the time in Tokyo, I looked for macrobiotic stores in there. Here’s a few that I’d like to try when I go back:
1. Chaya macrobiotics (マクロビオティック チャヤ）
It seems like there are Chaya Macrobiotics in Shinjyuku, Hibiya, Yokohama, and Kamakura. Since Shinjyuku is closest to my house, I looked at their menu. They use a lot of brown rice, whole grains, beans, and soymilk. Some dishes do contain fish or fish broth, so you should double check first. It’s in the fancy Isetan department store building and the prices are not that cheap. The lunch is $20-40.
One great thing about this place is the dessert selection. Their dessert don’t seem to have any dairy products or white sugar. They instead use things like maple syrup and soymilk.
They also sell macrobiotic food and ingredients online if you are interested and live in Japan.
2. Midorie (みどりえ）
This one is in Meguro-ku and I have actually been to this store before. The dishes I had there were pretty good and I’d go there again. They use organic ingredients but they have some meat/fish dishes as well. Vegetarian dinner dishes include: 7 bean spicy curry, mushroom and lotus root black sesame curry, soymilk porridge with vegetables and a hint of Yuzu (citrus fruit). The price range is more reasonable around $10-25. They also do take-out as well.
Tips:
-
A few easy ways to check the healthiness of a meal.
- Is my meal at least 1/2 vegetables/fruits?
- Am I getting about 1g protein/kg my weight (for the whole day)?
This month’s topic is “being vegetarian in Japan”.
It’s harder than you imagine. It’d be very easy if you’re pescatarian and I admit that I often am a pesci when I’m back there. Most stores use at least fish broth in preparing cooked dishes when not adding any living creatures. The concept of vegetarianism has existed there for a loong time, especially among monks. However, in modern days, people seem to see it almost as a virtue to cook Umi no Sachi, Yama no Sachi (translation: gift from sea — usually living things, gift from mountains) in a delicious manner. There is very little guilt or second thoughts in cooking meat and seafood; there seems to even exist gentle and peaceful feelings and respect in cooking mammals and sea creatures.
Anyways, that doesn’t usually convert vegetarians/vegans to pescatarians/meat eaters. So, I’m collecting information on how to be a good vegetarian in Japan — after all, nobody should be forced to eat cheese pizza and rice balls every day…
Stay tuned!