diet

The Great Natto Diet turns into the Great Natto Scandal

maki — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 19:50:44 +0100

Following up on the Great Natto Diet story:

The producers of the show Aru Aru Daijiten II commited several serious faux pas: falsifying data; presenting made-up data for tests that were never conducted; and, what I find the most amusing yet outrageous of all, showing an American university professor on screen then superimposing made up subtitles that had nothing to do with what he was actually saying. (Here is a YouTube video of the official on-air apology (in Japanese of course). The man speaking is just an announcer, not a station official. Here's a news report (Japanese again) of the press conference where the officials issued their apology.)
This story was front page news and a top story on national media outlets in Japan on Saturday. Like the Celebrity Big Brother thing in the U.K. last week it's the Scandal of the moment. It's made the international media too.
The program was produced by Kansai TV (KTV), a local television station and Fuji Television affiliate in Osaka, and broadcast nationwide by Fuji TV (which was also the network that carried the original Iron Chef...which is sort of ironic, maybe).
The program was pulled off its usual broadcast slot on Saturday evening. It remains to be seen if it will ever get back on to the air. (It was a very popular show...as the influence it had by causing a mad rush on natto shows.)
Its sole sponsor, Kao, has pulled its sponsorship.
Natto manufacturers may lose hundreds of thousands of yen in revenue because of cancelled orders. Natto has a short shelf life of about a week, and makers had stepped up production to try to meet the increased demand.

It sort of seems that the program producers went about creating this particular episode with the best of intentions, and based on actual studies about DHEA and isoflavons. But perhaps in a rush to get the show out by a deadline or sheer sloppiness (we may eventually find out, as this whole mess is being investigated by the Japanese government now) they really messed it up, to put it mildly.

One of the sad things that may arise from this is that some people get the mistaken impression that natto is a worthless food. It's certainly not, and as I have written earlier if you can get to like it it's a terrifically nutritous food. Just not a miracle diet food.

I guess the lesson to be learned here is never to take media reports on food and nutrition at face value; do the research, question everything, and make your own educated decisions.

The Great Natto Diet Rush: The sticky road to weight loss (maybe) (OJFTMHYLW extra)

maki — Sat, 20 Jan 2007 16:19:30 +0100

I was not going to talk about natto as part of my Odd Japanese food that may help you lose weight(OJFTMHYLW) series this week. But coincidentally, natto as a diet aid has been in the news big time in Japan, with claims that a 'magical' substance in this sticky food helps people to effortlessly lose weight.

Natto is one of those legendary really odd traditional foods that you probably have had to grow up with to appreciate, in the same league as Scottish haggis or Norwegian lutefisk. Natto are cooked soy beans that are fermented with a natural bacillus that is found on rice straw. The fermentation process makes them very sticky (think of the insides of okra, but much stickier) and very smelly. They are an excellent source of protein, and easily digestible, so if you can stand the smell and texture they are probably great additions to your food plan. But...from experience I have to say that the number of people who didn't grow up with natto who like it is pretty low. As I reported back in my original post about natto, most people back away with a look of fear and disgust.

Earlier this month, a Japanese "health" TV program called Aru Aru Daijiten broadcast a show about the amazing natto diet. Aru Aru is very popular in Japan, but it has more in common with programs like Ito-ke on shokutaku, pseudo-science presented in an entertaining and comical way, than serious science. Citing some scientific studies (none, oddly enough, conducted in Japan, where you'd think scientists would be most likely to study the health benefits of natto in depth) they claimed that eating 2 packs of natto, one in the morning and one in the evening, would help people lose weight without any further effort or change in diet. This was, they said, due to the isoflavones in the natto (and some other substance) which caused the secretion of DHEA.

[Update: now the president of the network that shows the program has publicly apologized for "broadcasting a programme containing content that was not based on facts". So maybe it's not such a sensational discovery after all :) ]

They then conducted their own 'scientific' test, consisting of 2 groups of 4 people each, who ate the prescribed natto for 2 weeks. The results were quite impressive: up to weight 3.4 kg (7.5 pounds) was lost by the subjects in those two weeks. They also claimed that various health barometers like cholesterol, blood sugar, blood pressure, etc. went down dramatically too. They recommended that the natto be mixed at least 50 times to really develope those sticky strings, as well as leaving it for at least 15 minutes before eating, for maximum effect. I guess this means that the beneficial ingredients are in the sticky parts. Here's how natto looks after this treatment.

Yes this natto was eaten after the shot.

Interestingly, today (January 20th) there is a statement (Japanese) on their web site retracting many of those claims, such as the fact that that two of the subjects' announced results were erroneous; that the statements that were supposed to be made by an American scientist were wrong or nonexistent, and that they didn't even conduct some of the tests that were shown during the program. They even admitted to showing different people in the 'before' and 'after' shots! Whether connected to this or not, they've cancelled the showing of their regular program this Sunday the 21st. (The program has now been suspended indefinitely. Also see retraction by network president above. Incidentally, apologizing to the public is a popular thing to do by company officials and politicians in Japan when things go wrong.)

It may be too late though, because the original program caused a mass rush on natto in Japan, causing sellouts at supermarkets.

The one thing that I think is valid is that natto is soy beans, which are quite filling, so that may decrease food consumption anyway. About those other claims...well I just don't know. It just goes to show how fad-crazy Japan is, and how diet fads are prevalent all over the world.

Now I did grow up with natto, and I love it. But two packs a day, every day? I don't think even I could stand that. Besides the fact that natto in Switzerland is not cheap, and making my own natto is territory I have yet to explore. (My grandmother used to make it sometimes, and all I remember is that it takes on the odor of an uncleaned toilet at one stage, before it 'settles' at the end to edible levels.) There's also the issue of natto-hating co-habitants, friends and other acquaintances who may not appreciate Perpetual Natto Breath.

If you're brave enough though and want to test those claims... If you do, let me know how it went. :) Remember, that's 2 packs of natto a day, morning and evening, every day, with your regular meals. You may have to adjust your breakfast and dinner menus though...cornflakes with natto may not fit well.

Bonus recipe: natto with raw egg

1 pack natto
1 raw fresh egg
soy sauce to taste
1 cup hot rice

Mix the natto well until it's very sticky. Break in the egg and whip rapidly with chopsticks until all creamy. Add soy sauce to taste, and optionally mustard (the English kind, not the French kind), finely chopped green onions, bonito flakes, etc.

Mound the rice in a bowl and make a hole in the middle. Pour in the natto-egg mixture. Mix well. Slurp immediately.

Reading: Japanese Women Don't Get Old or Fat: Secrets of My Mother's Tokyo Kitchen

maki — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 15:31:20 +0100

[Update:] See some related thoughts about the subject of why Japanese people in Japan don't get that fat here.

I stumbled upon Japanese Women Don't Get Old or Fat when I was browsing around Amazon some time ago. When I first read the title, I laughed. It seemed like a quite obvious attempt to cash in on the success of French Women Don't Get Fat: The Secret of Eating For Pleasure. Also (and this applies to the French Women book too) it makes such a sweeping generalization right there in the title, which borders on the ludicrous. But I was curious about it so I decided to get it for the sake of research.

The short review: it's not as bad as I thought it would be, and may serve as a good introduction to Japanese cooking, though definitely not the best.

The diet and weight loss points made in this book could be summed up in a few bullet points:

Don't overeat - observe the hara hachibunme rule (eat until you are 80% full). Hara hachibunme is a common Japanese term: it appears also in a book I reviewed previously, Hungry Planet,, in the Okinawa chapter. (Okinawa has the most longevity of anyplace in the world.) Another term my mother likes to quote to me quite often is hara mo mi no uchi - your stomach is a part of your body. In other words, don't overeat!
Eat a lot of fresh vegetables.
Eat a wide variety of foods.
Eat more whole grains - eat brown rice rather than polished white rice.
Eat fruit for dessert, or small portions if you must have cake etc.

Obviously, it is not necessary to eat Japanese food to accomplish these goals. But I do agree with the point made in this book that traditional Japanese food is inherently healthy. As you probably know if you have been reading this site, I am Japanese but have lived most of my adult life in other countries. So my everyday cooking is a mishmash of various styles. If I could afford to in terms of both time and money though, I would cook and eat Japanese style most of the time.

Traditional Japanese food centers around rice (gohan, which is also a synonym for a meal), with small portions of okazu, savory things that go well with the plain rice. A typical Japanese dinner would have, besides the rice, 1 small bowl of soup (miso or clear), 1 protein dish such as grilled fish, and 2 or 3 other mostly vegetable-based side dishes.

A popular dietary guide in Japan that has been around for decades is to try to eat 30 kinds of food items a day for nutrional well-roundedness. This may sound impossible, but in Japanese cooking it's not that out of reach.

But then, there are the French, not to mention the Swiss

If you go to France, most women are not overweight. Many, especially in Paris, are in fact skin-and-bones slim. What may be less known is that here in Switzerland too, there aren't many overweight people - though older women tend to look more sturdy and well-muscled. Whenever I go to the U.S., or for that matter to the U.K. too, I always get a mild shock when I see the number of very overweight people. You simply don't see many of them here.

Swiss food is a mix of French, German, Italian and native Alpine - featuring loads of butter, cheese, bread and potatoes. Veal is the most popular meat, especially for company (chances are if you are invited to a Swiss home you're going to get veal in some form). So why aren't more Swiss people overweight?

The answers I think are the usual: moderation and exercise. Portions here are quite small compared to those in the U.S. The delicious pastries available at Sprüngli are barely bigger than my palm, and their handmade _truffe du jour_ is so rich that one (and yes, they do sell them by the piece) is enough to satisfy any chocolate urge.

Swiss people also exercise a lot. Whenever we're invited to someone's house, invariably we go for a walk after dinner to stretch our legs and to see the neighborhood. The house I live in is on a corner, and I always see couples and families walking or biking past on the weekends. And of course a lot of people participate in winter sports as well as hiking and camping in the summer.

What's the typical after-dinner-party activity in the U.S.? Watch TV, or maybe play board games?

Societal pressures

Getting back to why Japanese women aren't overweight: I discussed this with some Japanese people and we all seem to agree that in Japan, there is a lot of societal pressure to stay slim. Young girls often starve themselves so they can be fashionable. Older women are also quite pressured to stay thin. The standard clothes size in Japan is junior size 11, which is about a size 6 in the U.S. Japan is inherently a comformist society, so it's difficult to 'stick' out in any way, including being overweight.

As far as Japanese women not getting old - they do of course. Do they look younger than their Western counterparts? Often yes, but I think that all Asian women tend to look younger than European-Caucasian women. I'm still being carded in American bars and I'm nowhere near 21 anymore. As far as the various illnesses related to getting older, while the incidences of heart attacks and diabetes may be low, there are other problems such as a high incidence of osteoperosis amongst older women.

So to wrap up, I would recommend this book if you want once with some nice recipes (though without pictures) of some basic Japanese foods, with some diet advice along the way. But don't buy into the premise that there is some magic aspect to Japanese food. If you overeat it, you're still going to gain weight! The main lesson to be gleaned from it is hara hachibunme.