Peeling Fruit in Japan

[gfell]

Why do the Japanese always peel their fruit before eating?

When I first arrived to teach in Japan, I knew I would be in for an adventure.

Allow me to explain 1 of my adventures in Japan.

Like toilet slippers, peeling fruit is a holdover from a time when maintaining basic sanitation was more difficult than it is today. Until the 20th century, the biggest source of fertilizer in Japan was "night soil", a euphemishm for human excrement.

Eating the skin of a fruit was therefore about as good for your health as snacking on a hot, steaming turd.

Although human waste is no longer used as a fertilizer, people are still reluctant to eat fruit that hasn't been peeled. With all the fertilizers and pesticides in use today, it's probably not such a bad idea.

Cardin M.
(English Teacher - Tokyo, Japan)

[dederick]

I had to convince my Japanese wife and my mother-in-law to allow me to eat apples with the skin left on them. My wife grew up never having eaten an unpeeled apple. Introducing them to baking soda did the trick! And now they clean all their fruits and vegetable with it.

[gfell]

Baking soda? Never heard of that before. You wash all your vegies and fruit in baking soda?? Isn't this an overkill?