At TETSU in northeastern Tokyo, you can reheat your tsukemen dipping soup by dropping a scalding hot metal weight into your bowl. There’s actually a guy standing behind the counter, grilling these chunks of heavy metal on a robatayaki. It’s a fanciful concept to be sure, but it’s surprisingly effective. The noodles ain’t bad either!

Cheese in ramen may seem like a half-baked gimmick, but it’s more sensible than one would think at first. Proper noodling is all about the umami, and good cheese, like the “tomme tomme” served at Tukumo in Ebisu, Tokyo, injects a mighty amount of sensation into an ordinary bowl of miso ramen. It’s no wonder this limited quantity specialty sells out daily. Ramen chefs take note. The curd is calling.

A native New Yorker in Tokyo overcomes adversity to open a ramen shop and become the toast of the town. An unlikely success story, a potential treatment for some Hollywood-style fairytale, or the achievement of a fantastic chef with exemplary skill and class, and an all around cool guy?  All of the above and then some. Ivan is great.

Bassanova serves up a heady stew of cosmopolitan fusion goodness in a quiet corner of Setagaya, Tokyo. How do Thai green curry and ramen noodles mix? Like Brazilian polyrhythms and jazz guitar, apparently. For those of you who have no idea what I’m talking about, let me put it in plain English for you. “Quite well, actually.” Quite well indeed.

At the edge of Nagoya’s old shopping district sits Misen, originator of Japan’s little known Taiwan-style ramen. A product of the area’s ethnically Taiwanese immigrants, stepping into Misen is like leaving Japan for an afternoon slurp. Bring on the beer, this is one greasy spoon that will remind you Asia is much more than an island nation of giant robots and Pocky!

Hot off the Tokaido Shinkansen, rameniac pays a visit to Japan’s shiny new ramen robots at Fa-Men. You’ve seen them on the news, now learn if assembly-line automation can truly build a better bowl than a cranky old dude with a towel around his head. Ladies and gentlemen, we are floating in a bowl of space-aged slurping. Now with official rameniac video!

In the shadow of Canal City Hakata stands Ichiryu, a world-class tonkotsu ramen yatai that dwarfs the competition if simply by the size of its queues. Rameniac makes it a point to visit this modest tonkotsu ramen stand whenever he’s in town, sometimes once, twice, even three times over the course of a stay. Yep, it really is that good. That’s all you need to know!

What could prompt an hour-long lineup on a small, residential side street in eastern Tokyo nearly every single day? How about Menya Kissou, a noon-only noodler with the #1 all time rating on Japan’s foremost ramen website? 120 million people can’t be wrong… or can they?

Change is upon us, top-down, in the form of… Obama Ramen! This brand-new Tokyo noodle shop has been chosen to usher the world into a brave new future of global unwarming, diplomacy, and flying cars. Oh yea, some guy got elected president recently. This ain’t about him. I hear he’s awesome too, but whatever. I’m hungry.

Hakata Ikousha represents the new wave of post-boom regionalized tonkotsu ramen, with a solid foundation in pork bone basics, innovative presentation, and the savvy to branch out across Japan. Next stop, the world? Judging by the youthful enthusiasm of Ikousha’s staff, the future is in good hands.

Shinpuku brings a taste of Kyoto to the hallowed environs of Raumen Stadium 2. How do the mellow, shoyu-infused stylings of one of Japan’s oldest ramen shops play in a town known for its pork bones? Don’t forget your passport on the way through the noren...

Ramen worth a ransom? You bet! Ever wonder what might happen when one jealous ramen chef accuses another of stealing his precious recipe? You get a double-soup doublecross that involves kidnapping, beating, and *ahem* apparent nekkidness. I couldn’t make this stuff up if I tried… 

Nestled in the heart of Tokyo, Ramen Jiro honten lands the first perfect score on our rating system. It was inevitable that the day would come, and this hugely influential ramen shop lives up to all expectations and then some. Some people won’t feel the appeal, but rameniac, for one, is a full-blown convert…

A multi-meal afternoon at Yokohama’s famed Raumen Museum yields a bounty of noodle-slurping treasures, beginning with Asahikawa’s Hachiya. Sixty years strong and what do you have to show for it? Burnt oil, saltwater, and a whole lot of flavor to be sure…

Kitakyushu ramen is well-represented at Canal City Hakata’s Raumen Stadium 2. Stylistically, Kokura ramen shops might not be all that different from their famous neighbors to the southwest, but blow-for-blow, Murasaki is one noodler that can definitely hold its own against the Hakata elite!

Canal City Hakata’s Raumen Stadium 2 is a bountiful bevy of prominent, predominantly Kyushu-area ramen shops! A star stand out on the food court, Isshin Furan swears by its Miyazaki stylings with a multi-hued menu of top-notch tonkotsu. Alliteratively speaking, of course.

Ramen in Fukuoka is typically served in smaller portions than in other parts of Japan. You can order kaedama and add extra noodles or, like, rameniac, simply adopt a bowl-and-a-half strategy. On the way back to the hotel from eating ramen, rameniac makes a pit stop for well, more ramen. Warning. Don’t try this at home, kids.

Rameniac burns a morning towing his luggage around Fukuoka’s Hakata district in search of the perfect hotel - wherever’s closest to the perfect bowls! First up, Aka Noren has been around for over fifty years, and the ramen is so old-school you might not even recognize the Hakata ramen it purports to have originated!

Now that we’ve named the 22 popularized styles of ramen, it’s high time we began… at the beginning. Join rameniac on his pilgrimage to ground zero for tonkotsu ramen, deep in the heart of Fukuoka prefecture. Taiho, it’s off to Kurume we go!

The venerable Hakata Ippudo will soon be making an all-out overseas assault on a very fortunate midtown Manhattan. What do jaded New Yorkers have in store for them? Check in with rameniac as he parts the red sea for a peak at things to come!