An Asian diet pyramid was developed by Oldways in conjunction with the Cornell-China-Oxford Project on Nutrition, Health and Environment and the Harvard School of Public Health in 1995. Asian countries have a low incidence of chronic diseases so a pyramid was developed to model the Asian diet. The Asian diet pyramid includes some of the following countries – Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesian, Japan, Laos, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, North Korea, South Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Each of these countries have distinctions to their particular cuisine but all of them consume rice. Rice represents a significant part of each meal of the day and is prepared differently in each Asian cuisine. Rice is quite versatile and can be made into candy and cakes, fermented to make wine or beer, or can be served steamed or fried.

Asian diets in general tend to consist largely of plant foods like vegetables, fruits, beans, legumes, nuts, and vegetable oil.