Munching on raw vegetables in Japan might be viewed with a bit of suspicion.  A plate of salad or bag of carrot sticks in the lunch room often invites a chorus of "Usagi-chan!" (little rabbit!).

Recently, though, the marketplace has been coming up with ways to sneak veggies into your diet that are a bit less crunchy.

A wave of juice blends have punched up their vegetable content to increase their nutrition. Kagome moved puréed concentrated greens off the supplement shelves and into grocery aisles with its Minna no Aojiru juice blends. The famously bitter green stuff is mellowed out with grape, apple and mango.