P
Japanese · Asahikawa, Hokkaido, Japan
Japanese Asahikawa Ramen and Double-Soup Shoyu System
Asahikawa ramen, from Hokkaido's second city, is considered one of Japan's four great ramen styles alongside Sapporo, Hakata, and Tokyo. It is defined by a double-soup (W-soup) technique: a seafood dashi (konbu, niboshi, or scallop) combined separately with a pork-and-chicken bone broth, then united at service. This dual-extraction system produces exceptional layered umami without the muddiness of cooking all ingredients together. The broth is seasoned with shoyu tare and finished with lard or chicken oil (torikomi abura) to protect against Asahikawa's extreme winter temperatures (−30°C recorded). Noodles are medium straight, with low water content (28–32%) giving them a firmer, slightly firm-chewy texture that holds up in the rich, hot broth. The low hydration means noodles must be cooked briefly to al dente before serving. Asahikawa ramen is a cold-climate bowl — every element is engineered to retain heat and deliver sustenance in harsh northern winters.
‹Swipe for the next dish›
I
The Market List
The benchmark for each ingredient, and who stocks it near you. Tap a stockist to go straight to the product.
For the seafood dashi
20 g
konbu
wiped clean with a damp cloth
Not yet stocked in British Columbia
30 g
niboshi (dried sardines)
heads and viscera removed if bitter taste is to be avoided
Origin · JapanT Amano Trading · Vancouver →
1.5 litres
cold water
Your own market
For the pork-and-chicken bone broth
500 g
pork bones
blanched and rinsed
Not yet stocked in British Columbia
500 g
chicken bones
blanched and rinsed
Not yet stocked in British Columbia
2 litres
cold water
Your own market
For the shoyu tare
100 ml
shoyu (Japanese soy sauce)
robust grade
Not yet stocked in British Columbia
20 ml
mirin
Not yet stocked in British Columbia
For finishing each bowl
1 tsp
lard or chicken oil (torikomi abura)
per bowl; melted and held warm
Not yet stocked in British Columbia
For the noodles
400 g
medium straight ramen noodles
low-hydration, 28–32% water content
Your own market
Toppings
4 slices
chashu (braised pork belly)
thinly sliced
Not yet stocked in British Columbia
60 g
menma (bamboo shoots)
rinsed
Not yet stocked in British Columbia
4
soft-boiled eggs
halved lengthwise
Your own market
2
spring onions
finely sliced
Your own market
Each tap is counted, so the stockist sees the demand Provenance sends them.
II
The Method
1
Prepare the seafood dashi. Combine konbu and cold water in a pot. Bring slowly to just below a simmer — approximately 60–65 °C — and hold for 30 minutes without boiling. Remove konbu. Add niboshi, raise heat to a bare simmer, and extract for a further 10 minutes. Strain through a fine sieve into a clean vessel and reserve separately. The dashi is done when it is pale gold and carries a clean, sweet-marine aroma with no bitterness.
2
Prepare the pork-and-chicken bone broth. Place blanched bones in a separate pot with cold water. Bring to a boil, reduce to a steady simmer, and cook for a minimum of 3 hours, skimming impurities as they rise. Do not combine this pot with the seafood dashi at any stage of cooking. The broth is ready when it is opaque, ivory in colour, and carries a full, rounded animal richness without any sharp or acrid off-notes.
3
Prepare the shoyu tare. Combine shoyu and mirin in a small saucepan. Warm gently over low heat, stirring, until just unified — do not boil. Remove from heat and hold at room temperature. The tare is added per bowl at service, not to the master broth. This is where the dish lives or dies: under-seasoning the tare or adding it to the collective broth in bulk destroys the precise per-bowl seasoning control that defines the Asahikawa style and flattens the layered umami produced by the double-soup system.
From the canon — Tare (pronounced 'tah-reh') is the concentrated seasoning paste or sauce added to a ramen bowl before the broth is poured — the preparation that gives each s… Shoyu Tare: Seasoning the Ramen Bowl →
4
At service, bring both broth components to a vigorous heat separately. Combine the seafood dashi and the pork-and-chicken bone broth in the bowl in the ratio that delivers balanced layered umami — a starting proportion of roughly equal parts is standard. The bowl is ready when the combined broth reads clean marine depth followed by full animal body, without either element overwhelming the other.
5
Cook the low-hydration straight noodles in a large volume of rapidly boiling unsalted water. Due to their low water content (28–32%), they require only brief cooking — typically 60–90 seconds. Remove when they are al dente: firm with a slight resistance at the core. Do not overcook; these noodles absorb liquid quickly once in the hot broth.
6
Assemble each bowl. Add 25–30 ml of shoyu tare to the warmed bowl first. Ladle in the united hot double-soup broth. Add drained noodles. Float 1 teaspoon of lard or chicken oil (torikomi abura) across the surface — this fat layer is a functional heat-retention device and must not be skimmed. Arrange chashu, menma, egg, and spring onion. The bowl is complete when the surface carries a visible sheen of fat and the broth temperature, protected beneath it, remains scalding throughout.
III
Quality Hierarchy
01
Reserve — Hokkaido-sourced scallop (hotate) dashi replacing or augmenting niboshi; aged tamari-grade shoyu tare; free-range chicken carcasses and heritage-breed pork bones for the animal broth; house-rendered torikomi abura.
02
Estate — Niboshi dashi with high-grade konbu (Rishiri or Rausu); artisan shoyu blended for ramen application; good-quality pork and chicken bones sourced from a butcher rather than a supermarket.
03
Market — Standard konbu and niboshi from a Japanese grocery; commercially available ramen-grade shoyu; pork neck bones and chicken carcasses from a reliable butcher.
04
House — Dashi-pack substitution for the seafood element; standard supermarket soy sauce adjusted with mirin; any fresh low-hydration straight noodle available locally.
IV
Sensory Tests
◇Smell. Seafood dashi reads pale gold with a clean sweet-marine character and no bitterness — no boiling-seaweed harshness.
◇Sight. Animal bone broth is opaque and ivory, with a full body that coats the ladle lightly.
◇Taste. United double-soup broth delivers clean marine umami followed by full rounded animal depth — neither extraction dominates.
◇Touch. Low-hydration noodles yield to firm pressure at the outer edge while the core retains a distinct resistance: al dente, not soft.
◇Sight. Finished bowl carries an unbroken sheen of lard or chicken oil across the entire surface, with broth remaining visibly steaming beneath it throughout the meal.
◇Where it lives or dies. The dish cannot cross the line of combining all stocks in one pot or adding tare to the master broth: the double-soup system exists precisely to keep seafood and animal extractions clean and separate until the moment of service, and per-bowl tare addition is the sole mechanism for precise seasoning control.
Pillar V
Cross-cuisine parallels are part of membership.
The dishes this one teaches you, across the cuisines — on every recipe.
Enter · from $49 a year
VI
What to Pour
The pairing
Sake
From British Columbia
Nothing from British Columbia holds against this yet.
Without alcohol
No pour without alcohol holds against this yet.
Why each one works is part of membership — Enter · from $49 a year →
The whole pairingPillar VII
Origin and lineage are part of membership.
Where the dish comes from and how it came to be — on every recipe.
Enter · from $49 a year
Sourced through Provenance