Sorry to be that guy,
but it is indeed Chinese. The Japs were just the first one to call it that. They even use the characters usually used for foreign words:「ラーメン」
on topic though...no one is eating ramen at 4 AM unless they're high as shit, let's be real
That very article states in paragraph two that it was invented in the Chinatown of
Yokohama. Not Peking or Shanghai. The Japanese wiki elaborates on that, explaining how a Japanese-owned Chinese restaurant had the idea in 1910. Even the chinks themselves call this dish "Japanese ramen." Whatever the ancient chinks referred to as "ramen" wasn't this elaborate construct of a dish, but simply a method of preparing noodles, making them long not by cutting the dough, but by stretching it.
Now, when people say ramen, is it an image of this kind that conjures up in your mind?
Or is it this?
I think the answer speaks for itself. The dish is Japanese, invented in Japan, while the noodles in it are prepared using a Chinese method, invented in China and brought to Japan by Chinese cooks. The fact that both are called ramen is confusing, but there we are.
I'm really hoping this whole debate joins the ranks of the tripod and such. They provide so much flavour to the thread.
