What kind of ramen noodles are there

Photo by ayustety on Flickr. Taiwan ramen features ramen noodles in a shoyu broth topped with spicy ground pork and nira garlic chives. The dish pre-dates the spicy food trend in Japan, but its popularity has held strong and fast over the decades!

Okinawa, the chain of islands off the southwestern tip of Japan, was once an independent archipelago separate from the rest of Japan known as the Ryuku Kingdom. Okinawa soba also uses unique toppings compared to other styles of ramen, including bone-in pork rib and pig trotters.

Read: 8 Okinawan Food Treasures. Photo by saeru on Flickr. Hakodate, a port city in Hokkaido, is considered the home of shio, or salt-based, ramen.

The clear soup broth is made with chicken, pork, seafood, and kelp served with straight noodles cooked until tender. Although shio ramen is no saltier than shoyu ramen, it has a slightly different flavor profile to shoyu ramen with a cleaner, lighter taste that allows the chicken, pork, and seafood flavors to come through.

Kurume ramen is the original style of Kyushu ramen that predates even the highly popular Hakata tonkotsu ramen. Instead, the ramen here uses a blended broth of pork, chicken, dried sardines, vegetables, and dried shiitake mushrooms topped with scorched scallions. Beyond the broth, the second key aspect of ramen is noodles. Some ramen shops serve thick and chewy noodles, while others offer thinner, less-glutenous specimens. Noodles are usually long and can be straight, or wavy in shape.

Ramen noodles, also called soba not to be confused with buckwheat soba noodles , are made from wheat flour, egg, salt and kansui mineral water. Some ramen shops allow customers to customize their noodles by selecting thickness thin, regular, thick , or doneness regular, firm. While ramens usually come with specific toppings, chefs often allow customers to add extra toppings. Common additions include extra orders of thinly-sliced, fat-marbled braised or roasted pork chashu , bamboo shoots, seaweed, scallion, bean sprouts, fish cake, boiled egg marinated in soy sauce and mirin.

By Kat Odell Updated January 24, Save FB Tweet More. Miso Ramen. Shoyu Ramen. Shio Ramen. Tonkotsu Ramen. Some even say that tonkotsu broth is as creamy as milk. Throw some ginger on this buttery broth and curl up with a good book. This salty broth is considered the oldest of the ramen broths. Typically, a shio broth is made with chicken or pork base. Often, shio ramen contains quite a lot of seaweed.

If you have issues with sodium, this would be the ramen to avoid. Developed in Hokkaido, Japan in the s, this broth is considered the youngest of the ramen broths. Unlike the others, this nutty, sweet soup is entirely Japanese. Miso hungry just thinking about it.

This form of ramen seems like the most fun.