Take that, stereotypes!

You may remember a recent controversy where a Sega executive referred to champion esports players as “people who look like they would eat cheese beef bowls”. It’s a pretty negative thing to say about someone, as it insinuates that they’re sad, unpopular men who binge on junk food because they lack self-restraint, so netizens were rightfully upset about the statement.

But as it turns out, the stereotype of cheese beef bowls being a thing that only nerdy young men eat doesn’t hold up in reality, at least according to a survey done by beef bowl chain Yoshinoya. The company found that cheese is, in fact, the most popular beef bowl topping not among young men, but among young women.

In this survey, Yoshinoya asked 3,149 of its male and female employees, who range in age from their teens to their sixties, a series of questions. One of those questions was, “When you order beef bowls for your free employee meal, what do you usually choose for your topping, besides ginger and shichimi pepper flakes?” A whopping 34 percent of female employees said “cheese”. It tied with the more neutral “raw egg and green onions” for first place.

▼ The “raw egg and green onions” beef bowl

Male employees also said they like to add cheese to their beef bowls, with 31 percent claiming it to be their favorite, but it wasn’t as popular as egg and green onions, which earned 33 percent of the vote. However, among the male respondents, “cheese” appeared to be a popular topping primarily for teenage workers, whereas, for women and girls, it was popular for female workers in their teens and twenties.

Since the study was limited to Yoshinoya employees, the data isn’t exactly representative of the full Japanese population, but if anyone should know what’s good on a beef bowl, it’s the people who make them on a daily basis. And if the female employees as well as the male employees of Yoshinoya like to add cheese to their beef bowl, then why shouldn’t we all?

Source: Niconico News
Images: Yoshinoya
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