Ajinomoto Foods built a dense, rolled noodle so frozen ramen survives two cookings

BBC Future reported how Ajinomoto Foods developed frozen ramen bowls for the office microwave. Instant noodles are fried and dried and deliberately porous so hot water rushes in quickly. Porous noodles do not age well: left in broth, they swell and turn soggy. Ajinomoto Foods North America executive Taro Komura says the company began to consider a version closer to fresh restaurant ramen as American palates learned what ramen could be.

Food scientist Shinji Sasaki and colleagues aimed for the opposite noodle, a very dense one. Standard ramen dough runs through a series of grooved rollers that press out air bubbles and leave a smooth surface that is harder for water to penetrate. Three of these sheets are stacked and rolled out again, producing noodles significantly denser than normal ramen. They can be cooked twice, once in the factory before being nested with seasonings and toppings and frozen, and again in the microwave in four minutes. Ajinomoto has patented the roller system.

Freezing also helps the soup. When seasonings are dried for instant ramen, aromatic components can turn volatile and drift away, whereas Sasaki says more of a fresh broth's flavour survives freezing.

Instant noodles hydrate quickly because of their internal pores, which also makes them go soggy if left in broth.

Rolling dough through grooved rollers squeezes out air and gives a smooth surface that resists water.

Stacking three sheets and rolling again makes the strand dense enough to be cooked twice.

Freezing keeps volatile aromatics in the seasonings that drying would lose.

When a category's standard solution is built for one constraint, like fast hydration, flip the design variable for a different use instead of tweaking it.

The article reports no sales figures. It says the roller system is patented and that the team would like to use MSG in the US product, but that it is still unwelcome there.