It is what I am getting from my Globe menu:
"Ramen’s stock cools down in Japan but boils oversea; Some in Tokyo stay loyal to soup" by Anna Fifield | Washington Post August 17, 2014
TOKYO —Takeshi Yamamoto is one of Japan’s ‘‘ramen kings’’ — a self-described noodle-soup freak who has proved his credentials in a nationwide competition involving blind-tasting ingredients and identifying what ingredients are missing from popular soups.
He also could be described as something of a throwback in a country where ramen is threatening to become ho-hum even as its stock rises abroad.
Ho-hum is a good way to describe how I felt about this article.
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Ramen has become increasingly popular around the world. Japanese noodle-soup shops can be found from Sydney to Stockholm. In Washington, New York, and Los Angeles, long lines form at the hippest new ramen restaurants.
The Japanese government is also using ramen as a form of soft power — or at least al dente power.
Ha-ha-ha.
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Ramen came to Japan from China. The first known ramen shop opened in central Tokyo in 1910, but ramen consumption really picked up after World War II, when Japanese soldiers returned from fighting in China and started making their own noodles from rationed flour.
Back then, ramen was something made with all the odds and ends left over from other meals, a way to economize and avoid waste. It was the antithesis of sushi — which uses only the finest ingredients and for which less is more — but it still came to be considered integral to Japan’s culinary identity....
If this were all that were happening in the world I would very much enjoy it, but with so many other things happening in Japan I'm finding it hard to get this one down.
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I guess I'll just noodle around with whatever the Globe gives me as I remain focused like a laser to see anything Fukushima.
