the ramen blog & other goodies!

So Nissin is giving away little Gundam figures with Cup Noodles, but the main reason I’m posting this is as an excuse to tell everyone about the 1:1 scale giant robot in Tokyo!

via Trends in Japan

So Cup Noodle Light makes women wanna…take…off…their…clothes… If any guys out there are wondering what to cook tonight for your date, “friend,” girlfriend, wife, etc, I suggest you stock up on these NOW!

Now, I wonder if these will make their way to the states…

An elderly woman in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan, became ill after eating a Nissin Cup Noodle. After an examination, paradichlorobenzene, which is used in mothballs and insect repellent, was found in the soup. The specific Cup Noodle was traced back to a factory in Ibaraki Prefecture and was manufactured on August 30 of this year. Nissin President Susumu Nakagawa announced that his firm will voluntarily recall about 500,000 Cup Noodles that were produced on the same date.

(By the way, for anyone who’s wondering, Cup Noodles are known as Cup Noodle (singular) in Japan.)

via Japan Today with thanks to Cutie for the tip.

I came across a collection of Nissin Cup Noodle commercials that included this gem. I was in a Japanese exchange student program at the time, and this was my host mom’s favorite commercial and celebrity (she even had a poster of Ahhhnooold holding the kettles). She was also quite amused by the Arinamin “V” energy drink ads (the drinks on the other hand weren’t quite so amusing…blech). Ah, natsukashii yo!

Thanks to a radiused corner.

A few weeks ago I promised to review Nissin’s new health-conscious instant ramen. According to Nissin:

…eating healthier doesn’t have to feel like a punishment. Choice Ramen is 80% fat free with 25% less sodium than typical instant ramen. How’d we do it? The secret rests in a special air-drying process. It yields a healthier noodle with the delicious taste and texture you’re looking for.

(more…)

Chikin Ramen (and yes, that is the correct “Japanese” spelling) went on sale today, 50 years ago, in 1958. Chikin Ramen was the brainchild of Momofuku Ando, inventor of instant ramen and founder of Nissin Foods (maker of Cup Noodles). A moment of inspiration struck when Ando-san watched people lining up to buy black-market ramen during food shortages after World War II and he set out to create a food that would be easily accessible to everyone. After months of development, he sucessfully created and marketed Chikin Ramen, the world’s first “instant ramen.” Momofuku Ando, who passed away at the ripe old age of 96 last year in January, believed that “Peace will come to the world when the people have enough to eat.” Mr. Ando claimed to have eaten Chikin Ramen almost every day.