Japan's School Lunches Are The Envy of the World.

At school lunches, all the veggies were just boiled, not even salt added. They made the unhealthy stuff taste good but made no effort into making vegetables taste good

Holy cow. Seeing that kid who wouldn’t eat vegetables just blew my mind! My son is 14 and loves vegetables as long as their raw. Raw green beans, red cabbage, cauliflower, carrots. He eats grape tomatoes like their candy. And he loves nearly all fruit. And yes he is super healthy. He’s thin. Hasn’t been sick in years. My rule, each meal MUST have a fruit and/or vegetable. It’s a hard and fast rule at my house.

We just got back from a trip to Japan. We got the opportunity to spend time helping teach English from preschool to 9th grade. This video is spot on. The lunches were great! The students served and cleaned up after themselves. They also cleaned the school as one large group after school was done. Amazing.... This will never happen in the US. We are a super entitled group of idiots....

"Food education is the basis of human life" - couldn't agree more.

This is great, thank you, Chris!  As a plant-based family here in Japan, we find it frustrating how much influence the Western diet has on the younger generations.  So much meat and dairy everywhere that it's nearly impossible to escape.  The school system does a good job of teaching people about good nutrition. Unfortunately, when work life starts it's mostly a life of convenience foods filled with preservatives and long days in the office then off to the bar for nomikai.  We recently went to an Earthday event and all you could smell was fried and grilled meat, pretty sad.  Some people are starting to figure it out but it's such slow progress.  We work as consultants to educate and train places to prepare and serve whole-food plant-based options and we are noticing more interest which is great.  Good things are worth fighting for so we keep on keeping on.  Thanks again for the great content, you rock!

My elementary school lunches in France were created by a chef (his other job was the head chef at an expensive local restaurant…I think his kid was a student). It was very animal-centered, BUT I appreciated how we all sat together, served each other water, passed the bread. I always looked forward to the salad, and to this day I can still taste it. I had my son watch a bit of this episode with me. I really appreciate your content. ❤

❤I am an Asian living in SE Asia. I am very disciplined in terms of food and nutrition and am also researching topics related to immunology, immunotherapy and Gerontology. Basically home cooked meals and no seasoning, sauces or condiments and of course eschew processed and refined foods. In other words, I go for whole foods. I fully support the Japanese diet when compared with the usual diets in most Asian countries. Portion control is so important including their fruits intake as can be seen from the video. It is my plan to go to Japan for a few months to learn the art of preparing sashimi which I believe is one of the contributing factors towards the divine health spans of many Japanese. 👍🥰 Thank you Chris for this highly informative and educational video. I have been following all your videos for a few years and am like you I go gluten free, with only an occasional small portion of resistant starch rice. 💪💓God bless ✝️🙏

Always love your storytelling skills combined with top scientific journalism and food history! 👌

I am transitioning to a “mostly plants” diet after being on the Weston A Price Foundation bandwagon for the past 12 years or so. As hard as I tried to make it work for my family, we grew heavier and less healthy. Only long fasts were bringing the weight down, and it’s hard to keep that up. I love your vids so much! This vid has been one of my favorites. You have such a great, sane perspective. Thanks for all the hard work.

New subscriber & may I say that I enjoy your sense of humor & how your video's are presented. I have been binge watching. Thank you for non boring video's. You make me think more about my nutrition which is gearing more towards plant base.

Since I started watching your videos I have been chomping a lot more plants

Growing up we've eaten a lot of vegetables..and it wasn't even something i despised.. as an indian (unlike typical indians , we eat lil to no oil or fried spicy stuff..so i have a baby mouth and i adore bland food as my taste buds have gotten accustomed to the taste of all kinds of veggies) , i couldn't love veggies more cuz my mum would cook the most delicious veggie stews for us to eat.. I ate meat until i was 10 then turned vegetarian and when i was 14 i went vegan.. Also .. we did not eat a lot of meat as it was expensive... So like every twice or thrice a year .. eggs only during the winters.. Also the fishes we ate weren't marine .. they were local small fishes.. i did eat a lot of flaxseed dumpling tho..

Chris, I wish you could put out a new video every single day. Your content is fantastic!

Plant Chompers you should do an episode on fermented foods! I’m a vegan with IBS (long before I became vegan), and fermented foods have helped me manage it unlike anything else. You could review doctors like Justin Sonnenburg, the FE FI FO trial, etc. There seem to be new discoveries every day about the gut microbiome.

One of the problems in America is that the professionals aren't role models and look like hypocrites. Most nutritionists, nurses, doctors etc. that I see are fat, many are obese.

What a high quality content. You rock !

I`m so happy that you made this episode! Thank you for all the work you put into making these episodes!

In high school 20 years ago, I remember having pizza, chicken nuggets, and heavily sauced pasta regularly. The veggies were often soggy and rarely eaten. I imagine it's challenging to feed kids in the US nutritious foods when they're being fed nuggets and pizza at home as well, like I was. When I would get more nutritious foods from grandma's, I would turn my nose up at the beans, peas, and leafy greens that she made so often. I wonder if there are any school programs here in the US that are taking steps to educate kids about nutrition and have found success in introducing fresh foods to them 🤔

Proud to have graduated from one of those Canadian Universities attempting to glean wisdom from Japanese lunch programs! (Hopefully trains to follow!) At the age of 31, I look back on my childhood Canadian lunches (sandwiches, processed meat and processed sweets sometimes disguised as a source of fruit), and though I'm not sure if having children is right for me (housing crisis), if I did have kids, I would want them to have a diet and food education like they do in Japan!! PS. Still losing 2 lbs per week since your hyper palatability video! You're the man, Chris!

Your last two videos are probably my most favourite of your videos. I appreciate the different perspectives and practical tips to consider through a clever and respectful mix of story, culture and data.