alt Hacker NewsIt's much more nuanced than that.
Bread and water is prisoner food, but avocado toast and cream-cheese bagels at the corner bodega are considered mid-to-upper-class fare. Pasta (also wheat) can range from kraft mac-and-cheese (poor-coded) to hand-made pasta with pesto sauce.
Rice and tea (ochazuke) is historically the "bread and water" equivalent in Japan, but people of every socioeconomic class still eat rice and miso soup for breakfast, eat rice balls (onigiri) regularly, and generally eat a diet with a lot of rice.
Even though rice is the staple food of Japan, I'd actually argue that instant ramen is much more poor-coded these days than even ochazuke.
I wouldn't be surprised if the middle class and lower class eat more-or-less identical quantities of rice.
> It's much more nuanced than that.
> Bread and water is prisoner food, but avocado toast and cream-cheese bagels at the corner bodega are considered mid-to-upper-class fare.
That's not an example of nuance. An expensive fruit and a heavily-processed cheese are much higher-grade food than bread is.
> Pasta (also wheat) can range from kraft mac-and-cheese (poor-coded) to hand-made pasta with pesto sauce.
Same thing; cheese is a high-grade food, and even pesto is chock full of fat.
> Even though rice is the staple food of Japan, I'd actually argue that instant ramen is much more poor-coded these days than even ochazuke.
And this is a statement that even the poorest people in Japan aren't so poor that they have to subsist on rice. There's no question about which of instant ramen or ochazuke is a better meal. Instant ramen comes with tons of spices, fats, salt, some vegetables, and even a little meat.