Discrepancies in texture are not necessarily just a problem with the recipe. If you make a record of the temperature, time, hydration, and thickness, your craftsman’s intuition can become a reproducible skill.
The World Noodle Future Strategy Research Institute
Hello everyone. I am Rocky Fujii, founder of Yamato MFG.
The noodles were good yesterday, but today they are hard. They were good at lunch, but soft in the evening. Why does it happen if neither the recipe nor the boiling time has been changed?
In many kitchens, when the texture changes, the first thing people suspect is the boiling time. However, boiling time is the final step in the process. The real cause is often found earlier in the process.
What is known from research around the world
Peer-reviewed research introduced by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA ARS) has confirmed that the network structure of wheat gluten is reorganized during each stage of mixing, resting, sheeting, and cutting, and that this leads to changes in firmness and elasticity. In other words, even with the same flour and water, the texture will change if the process is different.
Furthermore, it is no exaggeration to say that the moisture content of wheat flour generally delivered in bags varies from lot to lot and from bag to bag depending on storage conditions.
If the moisture content of wheat flour changes by 0.5%, in the case of udon with a hydration rate of 50%, this is effectively equivalent to a 1% change in the hydration ratio of the dough.
Research conducted by Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology using dried pasta has shown that the flow of water in the boiling pot greatly affects the movement of water into the interior of the noodles. The way the noodles absorb water also changed depending on whether salt was present.
Everything from the size of the pot, the amount of noodles added, the time it takes for the water to start boiling again, and the flow of water can affect the texture.food. They survived precisely because they continued to evolve.
What Yamato MFG has observed for over 50 years
I have seen the same situation many times at noodle-making facilities around the world.
There is a recipe sheet. However, the flour temperature, water temperature, dough temperature, resting conditions, and noodle sheet thickness are not recorded. In this situation, it cannot really be called the “same recipe”.
A recipe is not just the proportions of the ingredients. It is a blueprint that includes the conditions all the way to the moment the customer eats the noodles.
Five items to watch starting tomorrow
1. Flour temperature and water temperature:
Measure them immediately before adding them, as they change with the seasons.
2. Dough temperature immediately after mixing:
Check whether it falls within the same range every time.
3. Resting time and temperature of the dough resting location:
Replace “leave it for a while” with a specific duration and a specific temperature.
4. Final noodle sheet thickness and noodle strand width:
Record the actual measured values rather than relying on your sense of touch.
5. Boiling conditions:
Record the amount of water, the amount added at one time, the time until the water returns to a boil after adding the noodles, and the time when the noodles are removed.
The important thing is not to look for a universally correct answer. The optimum values change depending on the type of noodles, flour, hydration, thickness, and the texture you are aiming for. First create your own restaurant’s “standard bowl,” and fix the five items at that time as your standard values.
15-minute A/B test for noodle texture
Divide the same dough into two portions and change only one condition.
Immediately after boiling, 3 minutes later, and 5 minutes later, record firmness, elasticity, and smoothness on a five-point scale.
Reproduce the better conditions once again the following day to determine whether the result was not just a coincidence.
Record not only the taste, but also the weight before boiling, the weight after boiling, and the cloudiness of the boiling water.
If you change three conditions at once, you will no longer know what made the difference.
One at a time. Test on a small scale. Connect the numbers with the texture. This is the shortest path to making your product stronger.
Why not work with a specialist to improve your noodle consistency?
Use your current recipe, target texture, resting conditions, and boiling conditions, and conduct a test production one-on-one with a noodle professional. If you want to experiment together with a professional rather than worrying about it alone, click here.
World Noodle Future Strategy Research Institute, theory no. 28
Noodle quality is determined not by the recipe sheet, but by a “chain of processes and conditions”. It is not about replacing a craftsman’s intuition with numbers.
Record the conditions when intuition works, and turn them into standards that anyone can reproduce.
Question for business owners
At your restaurant, can you tell us the flour temperature, dough temperature, and resting time on the day when the texture was the best?
If the contents of this article are even slightly useful for your product development or business management, please introduce this newsletter to fellow business owners, chefs, business partners and friends. Japanese noodle culture cannot evolve through the efforts of a single company alone. We would like to spread Japanese noodle culture around the world by learning as an entire industry and bringing our knowledge and ideas together.
The World Noodle Future Strategy Research Institute is a practical research institute that studies successful examples from around the world, AI, product development, texture creation, productivity, health, overseas expansion, labor shortages, and business strategy with the aim of advancing noodle culture around the world.
Fujii ‘Rocky’ Kaoru