The first condiment to be used by humans, salt is both essential for normal functioning of human body and fundamental to human culture, including, of course, its food dimension.

Although saltiness exists as a separate basic taste, for a seasoning agent you can’t get more simpler than salt which, in practical terms, not so much adds any additional taste but rather acts to amplify the inherent flavors of the ingredients which it is added to.

Thus, when you don’t want your food item or dish to exert any supplementary gustatory effect aside from that coming from ingredients themselves, yet, on the other hand, do not want them to be bland, you would naturally use salt, and salt only.

This logic applies to Ramen cuisine as well, and by extension to its nomenclature too. To explain why it is so, we might need to delve a bit into what could be a rather obscure topic even for well established ramen lovers.

There are two most common classifications of ramen varieties: 

– one is based on the type of soup stock used for that particular ramen dish (i.e. chicken (“tori“), pork bones (“tonkotsu“), etc.),

– and the other – on the type of the base sauce (motodare) used to season it with (i.e. salt (“shio“), soy sauce (“shoyu“), or miso paste).

Depending on the combination of the above elements, we can have “tonkotsu shoyu ramen” or “tori miso ramen“, etc. (other variables that can be introduced into this equation are whether the stock is “chintan” (clear light) or “paitan” (saturated thick), and whether it is a standard ramen (i.e. noodles in soup), “tsukemen” (dipping noodles), or a no-broth “mazemen” variety served with a sauce which is added into the mix of noodles and garnishes when eating… but we are certainly somewhat digressing here…^_^;).

On the other hand, when you simply say “tonkotsu ramen” or “tori ramen” without any modifiers as to which particular type of base sauce was used to make it, this would – by default – mean a ramen made with shio (salt) motodare.

You can learn more about Ramen soup theory by reading a free booklet authored by Kaoru Fujii, Yamato’s founder and CEO, available >here<, but to familiarize with a practical side of the issue, including ingredients, noodle making methods, dish preparation, plating techniques for Shio Ramen – join Yamato on August 27, 2020 for a free online class broadcast live from our Headquarters in Kagawa.

NOTE: we are looking forward for, and would definitely welcome your watching the live broadcast, but should it be difficult, you would still be able to watch a recorded version of the class using the same link sent to you upon your registration.