Food creator Miica Fran is on a mission to save the planet through her “special healing power” of salvaging and savoring vegetables.
Fran runs an experimental zero-waste kitchen, Bio Labo House, out of aVin, a wine shop and bar specializing in bio wines from Rhone and Provence, on a cozy street in Tokyo’s Meguro Ward.
Despite the ubiquity of Japanese concepts like mottainai (“what a waste”), the Environment Ministry reports that the average amount of food thrown out per person, per day “could fill up an entire rice bowl,” even though Japan’s food self-sufficiency stands at a paltry 37 percent.