I really miss being able to walk into a Lawson’s or 7-Eleven or (last resort) a Family Mart and picking up something convenient, tasty, healthy and inexpensive. Can’t do that in the US anywhere.
Kind of hard to tell at the bottom, but most of these don't appear to be prepackaged meals (bento), but rather side dishes (souzai). Souzai are ready made side dishes that are meant to be part of a larger meal- often times they're fried foods or other things that are a bit inconvenient to prepare at home. The cheapest thing here (320 yen) is 8 slices of chaashuu, which certainly isn't a meal- you'd put them in ramen or something.
Also it's kind of cheating right now. The Yen's exchange rate with the dollar has gone to shit (currently 131 yen to 1 dollar, better than last week at least), so while these are very cheap in USD, our actual incomes haven't really gone up with the yen devaluing. In terms of purchasing power parity, that 320 yen box of chaashuu is probably closer to $3.20 (320 yen is worth more to a Japanese person in Japan, than $2.30 would be to an American in America).
![image showing [OC] japanese grocery store. healthy packaged meals for as low as $2.30 USD](79eea1d5-c9dc-5364-bac3-7451d256b223.jpg)
sanfran_girl on August 1st, 2022 at 17:06 UTC »
I really miss being able to walk into a Lawson’s or 7-Eleven or (last resort) a Family Mart and picking up something convenient, tasty, healthy and inexpensive. Can’t do that in the US anywhere.
Zarmazarma on August 1st, 2022 at 18:39 UTC »
Kind of hard to tell at the bottom, but most of these don't appear to be prepackaged meals (bento), but rather side dishes (souzai). Souzai are ready made side dishes that are meant to be part of a larger meal- often times they're fried foods or other things that are a bit inconvenient to prepare at home. The cheapest thing here (320 yen) is 8 slices of chaashuu, which certainly isn't a meal- you'd put them in ramen or something.
Also it's kind of cheating right now. The Yen's exchange rate with the dollar has gone to shit (currently 131 yen to 1 dollar, better than last week at least), so while these are very cheap in USD, our actual incomes haven't really gone up with the yen devaluing. In terms of purchasing power parity, that 320 yen box of chaashuu is probably closer to $3.20 (320 yen is worth more to a Japanese person in Japan, than $2.30 would be to an American in America).
noping_dafuq_out on August 1st, 2022 at 20:09 UTC »
Hell, even in nyc, Japanese grocery stores are my lunch time goto option.