Our First Experience With Kamaboko & Narutomaki

I’ve seen many times mentions of Kamaboko and Naruto in ramen dishes and looked all over for them. This last Saturday we went to Uwajimaya and I found both! Hah! First, let’s check out Kamaboko. It’s surimi, which comes in many ways – for example, imitation crab is one form of surimi.

Here’s how it comes – on a little piece of wood! You slice it thinly and it can be eaten unheated since it’s steamed previously. It’s slightly rubbery and chewy – kind of like a cold-cut version of calamari. t has a very light flavor.

This is Naruto. There’s a popular anime character with the same name…

He’s got a little spiral on his head; he’s a ramen fan.

Hey look – the same little spiral! So it’s like a log of fish that you slice thinly. It is a lot like the Kamaboko except not as chewy and has a more fishy flavor.

Today I had some noodles with my son. He had a bowl of Nissin Dmae Ramen – the sesame oil flavor.

He was very interested in trying the Naruto and Kamaboko! The fearless Andy didn’t question ‘what’ it was, but was very interested as it’s from Japan – he’s in a club at school called ‘Nakano Club’ – they’ll have visiting students soon from Nakano, Japan and so he’s interested in all things Japanese. He liked the Kamaboko a little more than me – was hoping for a bit more flavor, but it was nice. I liked the Naruto better than he did. It had a slightly fishier taste and was less chewy. He ate the whole bowl of noodles though with all the additions! Not bad!

6 comments

  1. Just for the record, the spiral on the naruto character is actually on his belly. The thing on his forehead isn’t unique to him. But now I’ve definitely gotta try and find some of this stuff haha.

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