news

한어Русский языкEnglishFrançaisIndonesianSanskrit日本語DeutschPortuguêsΕλληνικάespañolItalianoSuomalainenLatina

every time i pass by an all-you-can-eat restaurant near an office building during lunch, the sparse amounts of food on people’s plates always make me feel ridiculous.

maybe four or five string beans, three or four slices of cabbage, a small piece of ribs or braised pork, a small handful of roasted chicken with edamame, and maybe a small spoonful of scrambled eggs with tomatoes. the portions of each dish were so small that they lay alone on a large white plastic plate, looking dispensable.

the restraint of picking up food was developed in the weighing restaurant. (photo/shunshun)

people sit in a bright restaurant and eat fast food measured in grams in a serious manner, which reminds me of the scene in a black and white movie where chaplin eats a boot with a knife and fork.

for those who have never tried this type of self-selected weighed fast food, it may be difficult to understand the steps that a working worker must take when it comes to lunch, which must not only be nutritionally balanced, but also stay within an acceptable working meal budget.

in recent years, the self-selected catering model has been widely spread in urban office buildings and work parks. in the past, it was malatang and mala xiangguo. now community canteens and fast food restaurants have also joined in. in fact, the former box lunch has become a self-catered one. vegetables, and the money is calculated in grams. in shanghai, the average price of 50 grams of vegetables is 3.6 yuan to 5.6 yuan, which means that the price of a pound of vegetables is between 36 and 56 yuan.

the beaten worker who was stabbed still loves the weighing restaurant deeply. (photo/shunshun)

one is willing to fight, the other is willing to suffer. from being assassinated to becoming a repeat customer, the self-selected weighing restaurant has its own rationale for keeping a tight grip on the workers. in fact, it is not how expensive it really is, but the engel coefficient of migrant workers that raises the alarm - a "2023 meal report for migrant workers" from the houlang research institute pointed out that shanghai migrant workers' work meal expenses accounted for 30% of their income. .

in an era when everything can be quantified, self-service weighing restaurants have cultivated people's high sensitivity to food weight and money. it not only eliminates food waste from another angle, but also points to a new reality of "seven-percent full".

at around 12 noon, migrant workers near the hongqiao office building in shanghai walked out in twos and threes to look for food. the shopping mall is connected above and below ground, and is filled with various restaurants and snacks. generally speaking, the higher the floor, the higher the price of food and beverages. but i found that even the meals on the second underground floor of the shopping mall are basically over 30 yuan. if it is not noodles, the price is directly at 40 yuan.

one day at noon, i decided to expand my search area while riding my bicycle, looking for a job replacement. until i was at a corner with a little traffic and saw a "xxx restaurant". the decoration of the restaurant was a bit like a large canteen, with dozens of dishes neatly arranged on a large long table.

it's past dinner time, and the restaurant still offers a 12% off discount during off-peak hours, but at this time there are only a few sparse dishes left on the plate. next to me, a man carrying a schoolbag was also carrying a dinner plate to pick up vegetables. he was picking up beef slices on a plate of pickled pepper beef, picking them up, shaking off the dried chili peppers and pickled peppers, and picking and choosing. finally, he there were only some vegetables lightly spread on the plate. it wasn't until i went to weigh and settle the meal that i finally understood why everyone else's meals were so small.

there wasn't much i wanted to eat in some of the leftovers. i only had about half of the usual amount. after discounting it at 20%, i found it cost 28 yuan. including a bowl of rice that cost 3 yuan, the total cost was 31 yuan. i began to regret that i didn’t ditch the side dishes like the big brother next to me when i was playing. in the end, i had to drink two large bowls of free tomato and egg soup to appease my heart.

on social platforms, many young people have encountered similar "fast food assassins". (picture/screenshot of xiaohongshu)

in recent years, many restaurants with self-selected weighing models have emerged on the market. in addition to restaurants such as malatang and xiangguo that originally require you to pick up your own dishes, chinese fast food such as mr. rice, laoxiang chicken, and countryside chicken have all launched this model. in addition, there are similar "smart restaurants" of various sizes.

generally, in such restaurants, 50 grams is used as the measurement unit, that is, one tael, usually ranging from 3.6 yuan/50 grams to 5.28 yuan/50 grams. the price of the self-selected fast food ceiling "little girl head" is 5.28 yuan/50 for non-members. gram. initially, people who have little sense of weight may find the unit price of four to five yuan acceptable. it is not until they experience it for themselves that they understand what forty or fifty yuan per pound of vegetables means (for comparison, the price of domestic cherries in peak season is about 50 yuan per catty).

(photo/"twenty not confused")

although the price is a bit stinging, the advantages of the self-selected weighing restaurant are also obvious.

for shanghai's urban beauties who strictly control their carbohydrate intake, the choices of food for one person seem dazzling. in fact, most of them are pasta and powder, in addition to carbohydrates, they are also carbohydrates. the self-selected weighing restaurant tells you that you can eat 30 kinds of dishes in one meal here. for chinese stomachs who want to eat a variety of vegetables and meat but don’t want to eat dry “white people’s rice”, this is a good choice. a nutritionally balanced compromise.

according to the recommendations of the "dietary guidelines for chinese residents (2016)", "chinese people should consume 300 to 500 grams of vegetables and 200 to 350 grams of fruits every day." yuan, can barely meet this fruit and vegetable intake standard.

how many days can a migrant worker continue to eat white people's rice? (photo/unsplash)

in addition, compared to the pre-prepared dishes in chain restaurants that cost thirty or forty yuan a portion, the self-selected restaurants' "freshly fried dishes" are quite popular. through the display window in the self-selected area, you can see several employees pouring prepared dishes into the bucket of the semi-automatic cooking machine. as the drum rotates at a constant speed and quantity, the vegetables complete a gorgeous transformation and become dishes with "pot gas" on the workers' plates.

village base has also mentioned many times in its prospectus that the "dish-weighing model" will help increase customer flow. in 2021, the seat turnover rate of mr. rice's restaurants operating under the "dish-weighing model" was 4.7 times, which was higher than the average seat turnover rate of 4.3 times for all other mr. rice restaurants in the same year.

the migrant worker who was assassinated quickly figured out a set of food-picking skills in front of the restaurant of his choice. i once lamented that the hands of the aunties in the cafeteria were shaking when picking up dishes. now i have learned to shake off the side dishes such as onions, peppers, ginger, onions, garlic, etc., and then shake off the oil and water. try not to provoke food that is too thickened, otherwise it will weigh just went up. in addition, free food is available, such as free soup and free kimchi.

many netizens have shared their tips on how to avoid weighing food in self-service weighing restaurants on social media. (picture/xiaohongshu@unprofessional food connoisseur)

of course, the most important thing is not to go to the self-service weighing restaurant when you are too hungry.

migrant workers in big cities may have long been accustomed to such high costs of obtaining food. according to the "2023 migrant workers' eating report" by houlang research institute, in shanghai, if the standard of "one meat, one vegetable and one soup" is followed, the price of a chinese fast food meal is between 40 and 50 yuan.

what is the concept of forty or fifty yuan for a working meal? if we follow the standard of 45 yuan/meal and calculate it based on 22 working days in a month, the total lunch cost for workers will be 990 yuan. if dinner is included, it will cost 1,980 yuan. this does not include the time when colleagues usually make an appointment to go to the restaurant to open a small stove.

working meals stumped the migrant workers. (picture/tu chong creative)

according to data released by the shanghai municipal people's government, the per capita disposable income of shanghai's permanent urban residents will be 84,834 yuan in 2023, with an average monthly income of 7,069 yuan.

calculated in this way, the monthly work meal expenditure of 1,980 yuan accounts for nearly 30% of the disposable income. calculated based on per capita consumption expenditure, the per capita consumption expenditure of permanent urban residents in shanghai in 2022 will be 52,508 yuan, with an average monthly consumption expenditure of approximately 4,375 yuan. the expenditure on two working meals has accounted for nearly half of residents’ consumption expenditure, and the engel coefficient is full.

in this sense, compared to the kind of fixed-price dishes, the self-selected weighing restaurant gives people a sense of freedom of "being rich and frugal". people can control the relationship between appetite and price by adjusting the amount of rice they eat.

actually, if you think about it, there are more and more weighing restaurants nowadays, such as malatang, xiangguo, self-service fast food, etc., educating workers on the need to save food at an affordable price. after all, every dish is marked with a price, and people have weighed it repeatedly when picking up the dishes.

when picking up food, people's psychological activities are complex. (photo/shunshun)

in addition, today, when working people face carbohydrates as if they are facing a formidable enemy, eating only seven times full is not only a sophisticated slogan for healthy weight loss, but also a reality.

under the principle of eating less carbohydrates, people's satiety can only be supported by dishes. however, the price of vegetables is as expensive as cherries, so the workers began to consciously tame their stomachs and let them gradually adapt to the small food intake. eat healthy until the weekend to wash away the class smell, and then meet up with friends for a revenge meal.

migrant workers have always been creative in solving the problem of working-class meals: some eat the rice they brought to fool white people, some eat mcdonald's "poor man" meal, some grab leftover blind boxes, and some fall in love with the food served in restaurants. children's meal... it all boils down to the tightness of your wallet.

many internet celebrity restaurants have begun to moderately adjust their prices and launch consumption-downgraded meals that are more suitable for workers' physiques.

how and what to eat while working are also closely related to the development of the times.

in 2021, the japan welfare diet association conducted a survey among 600 office workers in japan from their 20s to their 50s. the results showed that 29.5% of people skip lunch during the workday. among them, 56.5% said they eat lunch "at least once a week or less", 28.2% said it "2-3 times a week", and the remaining 15.3% said they eat lunch no more than four days a week.

is there anything more miserable for a wage earner than eating a sandwich for lunch? (photo/"perfect day")

about 60% of the respondents answered that they skipped or skipped lunch “because of money.” when asked about the worst lunch they’ve ever had, one person replied that it was just “mentaiko” and “water and candy.” of course, it is no longer news that japanese workers eat lunch casually and pursue fast food. however, in the past two years, workers even skipped lunch, which is not unrelated to the rise in food prices.

working so hard, how can i not eat lunch? seven-percent fullness is the tenacious and unyielding persistence of contemporary migrant workers in life.

author shun shun