Noodles ── Ramen
Tsuruga Ramen
night-stall soy ramen of a harbor town
Chicken-and-pork soy broth, raised by the night stalls of a harbor town.
- Origin: Fukui Tsuruga
- Shoyu — soy sauce
- About 340 km west of Tokyo
What it's made of
A soy broth built on both chicken bones and pork bones, carrying medium-thick noodles. It's tuned to be neither too light nor too heavy, a bowl sized to finish comfortably at a street stall. Slurped under the glow of a night stall's lantern, it's often remembered together with the chill air of a harbor town. The sound of a charumera horn drifting through the steam is said to be part of the memory too.
How it's made
Chicken bones and pork bones are simmered together, then combined with a soy tare, the basic method here. Working within the limits of a street stall meant balancing a broth substantial enough to satisfy with a method quick enough to serve fast. Running late into the night is also said to have shaped a stock built to hold up over a long stretch of service. Working within a single pot and a modest burner seems to have set the template for the flavor itself.
Why it took this shape
One account traces it to around 1953, when a food stall first appeared in front of Tsuruga Station. Train passengers, railway staff, and later truck drivers are said to have gathered at the stalls late at night for something to fill them up. A harbor and railway town where people kept moving through the night is thought to have shaped this bowl into the ramen served from lantern-lit stalls it remains today. It may be precisely because people never stopped moving through this town that the street-stall format itself took hold.
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
- Aizu RamenFlat, thick hand-made noodles in a clear soy broth. Said to trace back to a Aizuwakamatsu diner owner bringing home a taste learned in Yokohama — a second soy ramen lineage that grew up apart from Kitakata's, in the same Aizu region.
- Edokei RamenA soy ramen topped with a knob of bright red chili miso built on garlic and garlic chives. Stirred in gradually as you eat, it turns a mild bowl steadily richer and spicier — a specialty of Akita City.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Contrast
- Sakata RamenA harbor town's soy ramen with a strong house-made-noodle tradition and seafood stock.
- Takeoka RamenThe broth is simply chashu simmering liquid cut with hot water — a fishing town's invention, sometimes over dried noodles.
- Takefu Ekimae Chuka SobaA clear, golden-broth chuka soba tied to the area around Takefu Station in Echizen, Fukui. Scallions, kamaboko, and ham float on top, keeping an unpretentious, old-fashioned gentleness the shops there are said to have preserved along with the name itself.
Also from Fukui
- Atsuage no NitaThick fried tofu, blanched and scored with a cross cut, is simmered sweet-savory in dashi, soy sauce, and mirin with a dash of ginger juice. Fukui leads the country in fried-tofu consumption, and this dish is said to have moved from a Honkoko feast dish into everyday cooking.
- BokkakeThick fried tofu, burdock, and shirataki noodles are simmered in a bonito broth and poured hot, broth and all, over freshly cooked rice — eaten for over a century since the early 1910s. In Katsuyama it is said to take a chazuke-like turn, topped with fish cake and mitsuba.
- ChameshiRoasted soybeans are steeped in hot roasted barley tea, and rice is then cooked in that same tea — a dish from the old post town of Imajo, said to descend from Nara's 'nara-chameshi'. It is said to be indispensable at memorial services, Honkoko, and for daughters visiting home.
- Choju NamasuGround sesame is worked into a paste with miso, thick fried tofu, mustard, and vinegar, then tossed with shredded daikon, carrot, and snap peas — a New Year salad whose name literally wishes long life, also said to appear at memorial services and Honkoko.
- Decchi YokanSweet red bean paste is set with agar, sugar, and a pinch of salt into a thin, water-yokan-like winter confection. It is said to have begun when a young apprentice, home for New Year from a Kyoto shop, stretched a bar of yokan with water to share with neighbors, eaten by the kotatsu.
- Echizen Oroshi SobaA cold soba from Echizen, Fukui, topped with grated daikon and bonito flakes. It is said to originate with a soba maker a local lord brought from Kyoto to promote buckwheat as an emergency food crop.