SUPERSIZING JAPAN

"After all, the average Tokyo apartment is so small that it can make even a New Yorker feel like a caged animal. And only a cooking-averse undergraduate could love the typical Japanese kitchenette with its half-size refrigerator and an oven that can grill fish but not much more. To get around the lack of storage space, Tokyo shoppers shop more frequently than their American counterparts and tend to buy a lot of fresh food at local stores. The size of the classic Japanese meal - a few pieces of raw fish or a modest bowl of noodle soup - contrasts sharply with such American faves as the double bacon cheeseburger or the all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet.

......................

Thanks to an influx of American-style food, Japan is changing. In the 20 years from 1980 to 1999, Japanese spending on fresh produce dropped 10 percent, while expenditures on Western processed foods jumped 20 percent. Over the same two decades, obesity figures for Japanese males rose 40 percent. In the last 40 years, obesity in the population as a whole has more than tripled."

Article

[Note the supersized attitude ("average Tokyo apartment so small that it can make even a New Yorker feel like a caged animal; only a cooking-averse undergraduate could love the typical Japanese kitchenette")... As a former New Yorker myself, I've lived for 30 years with the "typical Japanese kitchenette with its half-size refrigerator," (no buckets of ice cream or gallons of Coke) and found it no problem. I now prefer it to supersized kitchens and fridges. In food, volume is inimical to quality. I can prepare some fine (fresh) eats in a Japanese kitchen, and Etsuko can do even better. We still cook primarily on just one gas burner, a habit we got into when we lived in Spain. If Japan does supersize, though, it will start with kitchens and fridges, then spread to the young...]