Ramen News Recap May/June 2021

Blogs, Guides and Stories:

The mastermind behind Ramen Nagi, Ryoichi Nishio, announced the release his magnum opus. The Ramen Encyclopedia “Ramen Taizen” (ラーメン大全) includes a mind blowing 1301 ramen related recipes on 1168 pages. The book is available on Instantramenshop.com, Amazon Japan or Rakuten Japan.
Keizo Shimamoto announced the opening of a new ramen restaurant in San Juan Capistrano, a good 50 miles South of central Los Angeles. The name will again be Ramen Shack. It will be interesting to see how he balances the responsibilities of owning a ramen restaurant with his employment at Myojo. In any case, I wish him all the best and good luck!
The Ramen Network Discord server had its first ramen cooking contest a.ka. shokugeki with the “curry” theme. 17 entries were pitted against each other, lots of creative bowls and interesting curry interpretations. Congratulations to the winner Huy with his winning bowl “Cincinnati Chili-Men”.
New posts of the Ramen Beast Newsletter on Substack
- Back to California: The Mission to Reboot Mensho

Videos:

May and June had some videos in store for us which were about ramen and entertaining for all the wrong reasons. I want to highlight Guga with his Naruto Ramen and Nick DiGiovanni with his Tonkotsu Miso Ramen. While Guga’s attempt is somehow passable with some issues, I would argue that Nick’s video is a catastrophic failure from beginning to end without any redeeming points. I don’t think I have ever cringed so hard from any serious recipe ramen video. Worth the watch just to learn what not to do.
Noodle folding makes all the difference between your bowl of ramen looking like a professional restaurant bowl or like the recent top post of r/ramen. This video looks at noodle folding in more detail:
【インスタ映え】ラーメンの美しい麺線の揃え方！(Instagenic/How to Dish Up a Noodle Line)
A question that needed answering, finally got answered:
What tastes better? Pringles flavored ramen or ramen flavored Pringles?
I apparently missed this in April, but here’s a great video with English dub to learn more about Hakata Tonkotsu Ramen.
Great video and look behind the counter of an iekei ramen shop in this video by oiwai channel.
Another rather video in the light entertainment section is “Which Sausage Expert Can Make the Best Ramen Sausage?”. Almost as culturally relevant as using instant ramen to fix your toilet.

Recipes:

Elvin Yung summarized all his experiences of making “G-kei” ramen, or more colloquially known as Jiro style ramen, at home. It’s a very in depth look at every component of the style and well worth the time of every ramen head out there. You can find the write up here: G-Kei: All you need is feel
Duck Ramen isn’t as common in Japan, but definitely among my favorites. Ramen Kaonashi has tackled this with their How to make Duck Ramen 鴨そばの作り方 video.
The probably first vegan ramen recipe I can believe would taste good has been made by Seonkyoung Longest: Tasty Vegan Ramen Recipe. I am pleased by the suggestion to add MSG and the absence of soy milk to create a faux tonkotsu.
Another one from Ramen Kaonashi, demystifying the Kanagawa local specialty iekei ramen:
How to make Yokohama Iekei Ramen 横浜家系ラーメンの作り方
I could really just link all videos by Kaonashi here, but there are so many, so please do yourself a favor and subscribe.

Podcasts:

Ramen Hunter:
022 The Kannana Ramen Wars with Abram aka Ramen Beast and Keizo Shimamoto
Way of Ramen:
None

Nama Japan videos:

Due to being quite restricted with the use of my private time in the recent weeks an months (i.e. I’m busy busy) I was concentrating on releasing shorter videos, but more of them. I don’t think I have ever released 8 videos in 2 months before. Hopefully I can throw in more elaborate and longer videos in there again soon!