Asahikawa Ramen Village

The Asahikawa Ramen Village was founded in 1996 by eight popular ramen shops on the outskirts of the city. While ramen in Hokkaido is famous for its miso base, Asahikawa is known for their shoyu (soy sauce) soup with a thin layer of oil. Shops serving shoyu based ramen can be found throughout the city. The noodles used are Chinese style wheat, which is hard, thin and wavy. The range of toppings is quite typical and includes green onions, pork, bamboo shoots and eggs. The eight shops in the ramen village are Asahikawa Ramen Ittetsu- an Matsuda, Asahikawa Ramen Baikoken, Asahikawa Ramen Aoba, Asahikawa Ramen Ishida, Ramen Shop Tenkin, Ramen Santoka, Ramen Village Saijo and Koubou Kato Ramen. Asahikawa ramen can be traced back to the early years of the Showa era. It was around the time the first original Hokkaido ramen was made in Sapporo, which combined various Chinese noodle dishes. After World War II, the ramen culture in Asahikawa focused on keeping the broth warm by covering it with a thin layer of oil from fat, soy sauce flavored broth made from pork bones and seafood stock and thin wavy noodles that were a little harder from normal.