Instant or gourmet? Tokyo or Cup O’ Noodles? Vegan or chicken?
Ramen has taken over the world. Where did this yummy dish come from?
Basically, ramen is noodles and broth. According to Stastista the World loves “Oodles of Noodles” to the tune of over 106 billion servings a year.
That’s quite a mouthful.
It all began in . . . China?
Take a walk down Ramen Street, a subterranean mall nestled beneath Tokyo Train Station. You’ll find some of Japan’s most famous ramen shops. “It was astounding,” Michael Russell reported in The Oregonian. “While ramen has roots in China . . . the Japanese have tweaked and formalized this dish so much it’s now distinctly Japanese.”
The Chinese love noodles. Many Chinese immigrants settled in the Japanese port city of Yokahama in the late 1800s, bringing along their favorite foods. One was lamian, soft wheat flour noodles made by twisting, stretching, and folding dough into strands, dating back to the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).
Japan was a rice-based culture; wheat noodles were very different.
The Japanese called lamian, “Chinese Noodles” or shina soba. Eventually they swapped the “L” sound for “R” in lamian, creating the new name, ramen.
By 1900, Chinese restaurants in Yokahama served what Wikipedia described as “a single dish of noodles, a few toppings, and a broth.” Portable food stalls sold ramen on the streets. It came at the right time – Japan’s growing working-class needed cheap, filling food. Ramen was ideal.
Things changed during World War II. Japan faced food shortages and rationing, forcing the government to outlaw street food vendors.
Post-war Japanese food distribution was inadequate. To get ramen people had to go to the black market controlled by Yakuza – a 300-year old organized criminal network (that still exists today). The mobsters extorted black-market ramen vendors. Thousands were arrested.
Imagine being jailed for selling noodles?
The U.S. flooded Japan with cheap wheat, promoting baking and eating bread. Most Japanese didn’t have ovens and preferred noodles. Food shortages persisted.
In 1958 Momofuku Ando changed everything.
