What Is Ramen? How The History And Elements Lead To Modern ...

  • Noodles The noodles may be the easiest way to distinguish ramen from other noodle dishes. This is because the Chinese noodles in ramen use “lye water (kansui)” in the flour during the manufacturing process. This gives the noodles a distinctive chewy and yellow color – a major feature of the dish – that is different from other wheat noodles like pasta and udon. This means that any noodle, despite its thickness, degree of curling or its boiling time, is referred to as a variation of ramen if lye water (kansui) is used for manufacturing the noodle.

  • Dashi “Dashi” (Japanese soup stock) is one of three elements that go into making the ramen soup base (the other two are “sauce” and, depending on the type of ramen, “fat/oil”). We will discuss all three of these essential ingredients in this article, but first, let’s start with dashi. The main components of this stock are animal materials (pork bones, chicken bones, and beef bones), seafood materials (kelp, dried sardines, shrimp, and sea breams), and vegetable materials (onions, Japanese leek, ginger, and garlic). The combination of these ingredients is unique to the characteristics of the restaurant.It’s important to mention here how soup stock is made. Soup stock is roughly divided into “thick white broth”, which is boiled over high heat for a long time and has a rich taste and flavor, and “clear broth”, which is prepared at a temperature just before boiling to keep its clearness. Thick white broth is often used in tonkotsu ramen, and clear broth is often used in shoyu ramen.

  • Sauce Sauce is also an important factor in determining the taste of ramen. It’s made by mixing spices and other flavors and ingredients with basic seasoning. Of these, soy sauce, salt sauce, and miso sauce are most commonly used.

  • Fat/Oil Some local ramen dishes are characterized using fat/oil. It adds umami and keeps the soup hot by forming a layer at the top like a lid. The fats/oils used for ramen include onion oil, mayu (scorched black garlic oil), spicy oil, lard or roasted lard, chicken oil and shrimp oil.

  • Toppings The toppings used for ramen vary and are often associated with the localized style that’s offered. The following are typical combinations:
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