Noodle nirvana: 10 things you may not (but should) know about ramen

1. Ramen has its roots as a Chinese noodle dish which was imported into Japan between the 18th and 19th centuries. Some believe the name comes from the Chinese word “lamian”, a type of noodle, but others dispute this.

2. The famous miso ramen was born in Sapporo in Japan in the mid-1950s.

3. Momofuku Ando introduced the world to instant chicken noodle ramen in 1958 (which was once considered a luxury product) and the cup noodle in 1971.

4. While nothing beats fresh ramen noodles, the Chinese are the biggest instant ramen noodle consumers in the world, going through about 40-billion servings a year.

5. Food writer Felicity Cloake in The Guardian passes on a tip if you want to fake the broth and cook it in a fraction of the time: Use soy milk which, she says, “mimics the creamy richness of a slow-simmered stock sufficiently to be satisfying”.

6. Slurping your noodles is totally acceptable; in fact, it is expected.

7. The Shin-Yokohama Ramen Museum 50 minutes from Tokyo is the world’s first food-themed amusement park and boasts nine ramen restaurants, each featuring a ramen dish from a different region of Japan. 

8. Ando invented the “Space Ram” in 2005, vacuum-packed ramen made with smaller noodles and a thicker broth, meant to be eaten in zero gravity, especially for Japanese astronaut Sôichi Noguchi’s trip on the space shuttle.

9. In Japanese ramen shops, talking is forbidden while eating.

10. Chefs have spent hours cooking the broth and it is what you as a diner are meant to start with before the slurping commences.