2-14-21 Shin-Yokohama, Yokohama, Japan
Web: Shin-Yokohama Raumen Museum
Phone: 045-471-0503
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Favorites Japanese Ramen Soup Yokohama
"The best ramen was from Eki, a Sapporo-based vendor of Miso Ramen - a rich, slightly spicy red broth with sliced bamboo shoots and scallions on top of chewy yellow noodles."
Imagine living somewhere where the word "car" meant only a cheap subcompact vehicle, because no one sold or drove anything better. What would people think when they saw a Mercedes? A Porsche? Or an SUV? Believe it or not, there's a word in the American vocabulary that's equally under-appreciated: "ramen." In the United States, ramen is virtually synonymous with "instant noodles," invented in Japan in 1958 as a way to let anyone with hot water have quick access to cheap noodle soup. And yes, the Japanese love them, too: instant noodles once topped a survey here as the most important Japanese invention of the century, and they even have their own museum in Osaka. But just outside of Tokyo, there's also a 15-year-old museum called the Shin-Yokohama Raumen Museum - that's the correct spelling - and it's dedicated to the real thing: the hot, freshly made bowls of noodle soup that inspired the low-end versions. These are entree-sized soups, featuring noodles that contrast in their medium thickness and/or flavors to Japan's fat, starchy udon and thin, buckwheat-flavored soba.
Real ramen consists of four key parts: the noodles are the most obvious, varying a little from recipe to recipe in flavor, thickness, and chewy or silky texture, but the broth, the vegetables, and the meat ingredients also play huge roles in changing the flavor and appeal of the soup. Most restaurants specialize in one type of broth and offer a default bowl of what is plainly called "ramen," featuring a few vegetables and two or three pieces of meat - typically pork - laid on top. Some, like Shin Sen Gumi, give the patron control over everything from the firmness of the noodles to the strength of the broth and the level of oil in the soup; many restaurants also let you add a la carte additional toppings, including extra meat and vegetables. Thus, by contrast with the appetizer-like instant noodle cup, it is possible to have an entire meal from a single ramen bowl, and if you're not full, restaurants commonly offer discounted second portions of noodles to add to your existing broth.
Though ramen has Chinese roots, it has spent the last half-century evolving into a Japanese phenomenon, specifically a regional one: as the Museum notes, ramen restaurants around the country started by aping recipes from major cities, but eventually created versions to match local tastes. The Shin-Yokohama Raumen Museum celebrates this diversity by using two of its three floors to house nine different ramen restaurants, each with a slightly different take on the dish, with their distinctions indicated partially by guide pamphlets handed out with your 300 yen admission tickets. It's "partial" in the sense that two of the restaurants are shown in the guide as offering Tonkotsu or pork broth, while four have Shoyu or soy sauce broth, two have Miso paste broth and one uses a Shio or salted chicken broth, yet between differences in the way the individual restaurants' broths taste, and the quality of their other ingredients, you won't have exactly the same meal at any two places.
The best ramen we tried at the Museum was from Eki, a Sapporo-based restaurant specializing in Miso Ramen - a rich, slightly spicy red broth with sliced bamboo shoots and scallions on top of chewy yellow noodles. Though the Miso Ramen includes soybean paste, it was nowhere near as overbearing in soy flavor as the Shoyu Ramen we sampled from Wakayama, Japan's IdeShoten, a substantially saltier, spiceless version that was loaded up with sliced pork and topped with a flower-shaped fish cake - both ingredients are commonly found in ramen, though not always in the same bowl. Here, the noodles were thinner, and all of the ingredients were drowned out by the brown soy broth.
Two different versions of Tonkotsu pork ramen were about as dissimilar as bowls of ostensibly samey hot noodle soup could be. The first bowl, from Komurasaki in Kumamoto, Japan, featured a zen-like balance of vegetable toppings - bamboo shoots, thin-sliced seaweed, and scallions - plus slices of chicken. It was interesting visually, but the flavors were boring despite a considerable layer of oil on top, which sometimes helps when broth is, as here, otherwise only mild in flavor. Tonkotsu pork ramen at its best, as at the aforementioned Shin Sen Gumi and a famous Osaka-based place we visited earlier in the trip called Kinryu Ramen, has a strong and almost milky broth that wasn't in evidence here.
By comparison, a bowl of Cha Shu Wonton Ramen from Hakata, Japan's Fukuchan was more expensive, but loaded with big slices of pork, delicate Chinese seafood wontons, and noodles that were a little more chewy than Komurasaki's. We were surprised that its broth was also a little light in the pork department, but at Fukuchan, every table had its own fresh garlic press with cloves of garlic, and one piece of pressed garlic turned the bowl into a strong, fun meal - nearly the rival of the Miso Ramen above, once we took the step to customize it ourselves. Here, the only other issue was the pork, which was surprisingly still a little cold in our bowls, and clearly not freshly sliced off a hot roast.
Another bowl, the last we'll mention but not the last we ate, was described by the guide as containing "salt" broth - properly translated as Shio, or broth made from salted chicken and vegetable stock. Interestingly, Shio is the oldest of the broths, most similar to Chinese versions of ramen, and generally considered to be the healthiest. As you can see from the Shio Ramen photograph, Karatsu, Japan-based vendor Muramasa doesn't shy away from the pork, but the chicken broth isn't as salty as one might expect from the name, the noodles are thin, and the veggies aren't exactly overwhelming. Muramasa is the newest restaurant at the Museum, and probably one we wouldn't visit again.
So apart from raw hunger, how do two people go through so many bowls of ramen in a brief period? One of the neat things about the Raumen Museum is its "mini bowl" system, which offers those interested in sampling multiple vendors' ramen the opportunity to get half-sized portions for around $6, versus full-sized bowls at $8 and up. But the Museum isn't accomplishing this feat by offering diminished versions of the vendors' soups: each vendor actually operates its own kitchen, has its own storefront with counter and tables, and maintains a line outside with a coin- and bill-operated ticket vending machine - you pay for your meal in advance, including whatever customizations you want for your ramen, then hand off the ticket to the staff, and just get up and leave when you've finished your soup. The Museum's restaurant floors are set up to resemble the streets of Tokyo in 1958, the year instant ramen was invented and set off the national ramen craze - a neat cosmetic and historical touch - while the main museum area is entirely modern with a large gift shop.
If there's any issue with the Shin-Yokohama Raumen Museum, it's that the actual museum section is very threadbare and entirely Japanese, with no offer of an English-language guidebook to accompany the English-language map of restaurants. This might sound unrealistic to those who haven't visited Japan before, but so many of the attractions - including the sake museum we visited in Kobe - are bilingual that it really isn't a stretch to hope that this one would be, as well. The gift store on the other hand is somewhat amazing, with offerings ranging from modern, refrigerated instant ramen to some gorgeous ramen bowls and all sorts of trinkets. All in all, it was an experience worth having, and though the ramen wasn't universally spectacular, there were enough highlights to demonstrate the wide appeal of the dishes throughout Japan, as well as how enterprising restaurants outside this country could easily improve their recipes to make this great idea even more popular.
