Benefits of a Japanes Diet

What is considered a good diet? Most informed doctors would say start with a varied diet:

As a rule of thumb a good diet should be diverse. We have seen so many fad diets focusing on one food type or another, but as our understanding of the relationships between food and health deepens, a consensus is emerging that diversity is the key. Several studies have shown that eating a wider range of different foods is in itself linked to better health and increased life expectancy. The Japanese are a case in point. Where Westerners are recommended to eat a minimum of 30 different foods a week (and actually manage only 15 to 18), the Japanese eat on average 27 different foods each day. A wider range of foods auto­matically increases the number of micronutrients consumed, and this certainly one reason why the Japanese are less prone to the 'diseases of civilization' - diabetes, heart disease and cancer - than Europeans.

The Japanese Diet is an example:

The traditional Japanese diet is packed full of nutritional treas­ures. Various soy foods are consumed, such as natto, miso and, of coursey tofu and other bean curd products. These are good sources of isoflavones, phytonutrients with a variety of health-promoting properties. Japanese people also eat a good deal of fish, including oily fish - which raises their intakes of the valuable omega 3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, needed for the body's metabolism to work properly. Green tea is another nutritional star' particularly rich in disease-fighting antioxidants. A wide variety of vegetables play an important role - bamboo shoots, aubergines, various mushrooms, sweet potato and Chinese cabbage. Rice is a staple food, so that the Japanese actually eat a medium to high-carb diet. It's interesting to note, pace Atkins, that Japanese people have amongst the highest rates of longevity in the world, and generally low rates of overweight and obesity.

Some American nutritionists have come to broadly similar conclusions about the importance of dietary variety, and now recommend that 20 different foods should be eaten each day. Unfortunately, if you choose the wrong foods, and at an average of 150 calories per portion, this can easily add up to 3,000 calo­ries per day or more. This might be acceptable for the active adolescent but is excessive for most middle-aged, sedentary and professional people.

So where do we start? There is general agreement that we should all be eating more fruits and vegetables - but how many portions of fruits and vegetables should we be aiming for? And what sort of fruits and vegetables are we currently eating?