The Rosetta Stone of ramen

by Joe DiStefano, Posted Jul 27th 2007 @ 4:34PM

Given my love of Japanese food, and my belief in the restorative powers of slurping down a steaming bowl of authentic ramen, I'm surprised that it took so long for me to happen upon Rameniac. I like to think of this site not as a resource but as the Rosetta Stone of ramen. Given that it lists 22 ramen styles ranging from the country's south all the way to Hokkaido all laid out on a map with links color-coded by soup base (miso, shoyu, shio, etc.), I don't think I'm exaggerating terribly much. There's also a section aptly titled "drooling" that reviews 15 ramenyas, some in Japan and some in the States. Add to that nine reviews of instant ramen, and all of sudden I'm craving a hot bowl of the stuff, even if it is practically August.

By the way the photo above is a bowl of shiromaru, or white sea ramen, from Hakata Ippudo, a chain with several locations in Japan as well as abroad. It's a pork bone soup with thin noodles, chopped green onion, luscious slices of pork and wood-ear mushrooms. This ramen is a specialty of Fukuoka. I have a sneaking suspicion that I'll be heading out to New York City's East Village for some soup in the very near future, as in the next 30 minutes.

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Filed Under: Food Porn, On the Blogs, Feast Your Eyes, Ingredients
Tags: asia, East Village, EastVillage, food porn, Fukuoka, grains, Hokkaido, Japanese food, JapaneseFood, miso, pork, ramen, ramenyas, shio, shiromaru, shoyu, soup, vegetables