Noodles ── Ramen
Sanjo Curry Ramen
the curry ramen town of Sanjo
Curry-broth ramen rooted across the town, at home and in diners alike.
- Origin: Niigata Sanjo
- Besides shoyu, miso, shio and tonkotsu
- About 230 km north of Tokyo
Lineage
What it's made of
The broth starts out the color of curry powder, and the more it's stirred in, the thicker it gets — in many shops it clings to a spoon. Curry is dissolved right into the ramen stock, so Japanese-style umami and spice aroma sit side by side. The noodles are medium-thick and wavy, built to carry that thickened broth, and some shops finish with stir-fried vegetables, pork, or a raw egg. Even the rising steam carries a whiff of spice, working on your appetite before the first bite.
How it's made
How it's built varies widely by shop. Some make the whole broth curry-based; others simply ladle a curry-thickened sauce over a soy ramen. There are dipping-noodle and chilled versions too — 'Sanjo Curry Ramen' isn't one fixed recipe, it's a loose category held together by the single fact that curry is involved. Visit three shops and you can easily end up with three different bowls.
Why it took this shape
Sanjo grew up as a town of metalworking craftsmen, and workers at the forges are said to have wanted food they could eat fast on a short break yet still hold up their strength through the shift. Curry's oil and spice keep it from going cold and cutting appetite, and it travels well for delivery without losing flavor. As a bowl to gulp down between stretches of heavy labor, a spiced, thickened broth took root in the town — a fit especially suited to work that breaks a sweat, and it still holds its place in this craftsmen's town today.
Before you go
- How to read a ticket machineShops that use a ticket machine (shokken-ki) often place their most popular items in a similar spot.
- Cash-only shops are commonEspecially at ramen shops, it's common to find places that only accept cash — often through a ticket machine.
- Foods to look for in summerA guide to foods often seen in Japan around summer — eel on the Day of the Ox, hiyashi chuka, somen, shaved ice, edamame with beer, and hamo — with rough pointers for finding them.
Dishes in the same style
- Abura SobaNo broth is poured at all — noodles are tossed in a soy-and-sesame-oil tare pooled at the bottom of the bowl, said to have started at shops in the Musashino area in the late 1950s, with vinegar and chili oil stirred in partway through.
- Betokon RamenA garlic-and-chili stamina ramen said to have originated in Ichinomiya, Aichi, devised from a repatriate's memories of Manchurian cooking. Its name is said to come directly from what customers started calling it.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Related lineage
Contrast
- Curry RiceA wheat-thickened curry sauce ladled over white rice, a yoshoku staple said to have arrived via Britain rather than directly from India, with the roux and toppings varying home to home and place to place, in some towns tied to a naval or industrial past.
- Sanjokko RamenA rich miso broth piled high with long green onion, devised jointly by ten Sanjo shops as a new local specialty distinct from the city's existing curry ramen.
Also from Niigata
- AnboA Chuetsu-region dish of steamed rice-flour dumplings filled with sweet bean paste, pickled greens or eggplant. Similar in spirit to Nagano's oyaki but distinguished by its rice-flour skin, reflecting land suited to rice rather than wheat.
- Echigo misoA red, savory miso from Niigata, also called 'ukikoji miso' (floating-koji miso) because its polished whole-grain rice koji appears to float within the paste. Its style is said to vary across Niigata's Joetsu, Chuetsu, Kaetsu, and Sado districts, each shaped by local climate.
- Fugu no Ko no KasuzukeA rare Sado delicacy in which puffer fish ovaries are salt-cured for two years or more, then aged for a long stretch in Sado's sake lees. Only ovaries processed by licensed fugu chefs are sold, and the practice is said to date back to the Edo period.
- Fukashi NasuA Niigata dish of kinchaku eggplant halved, steamed, chilled and eaten with mustard or ginger soy sauce. In a prefecture among Japan's top eggplant producers, it is said to have been valued as a cooling dish through the summer.
- Hegi SobaA soba from Ojiya, Niigata, that uses funori seaweed, the same binder once used to size thread for the region's textiles, as a noodle binder. It is arranged in small bite-sized portions on a wooden box called a hegi.
- Hiyashijiru Miso JitateA chilled soup from the Chuetsu region, dashi thinned with miso and studded with chopped cucumber and shiso. Devised to stay appetizing through the summer heat, it is said to be eaten on its own or poured over rice or noodles.