عربي English Türkçe اردو فارسى
Logo
Latest News
Varieties

Your Guide to Cup Noodles Museum

Instant cup noodles are on display at the Instant Ramen Museum on April 8, 2008 in Osaka, Japan for the 6th World Instant Noodle Summit. (Junko Kimura/Getty Images)
Instant cup noodles are on display at the Instant Ramen Museum on April 8, 2008 in Osaka, Japan for the 6th World Instant Noodle Summit. (Junko Kimura/Getty Images)
TT
TT

Your Guide to Cup Noodles Museum

Instant cup noodles are on display at the Instant Ramen Museum on April 8, 2008 in Osaka, Japan for the 6th World Instant Noodle Summit. (Junko Kimura/Getty Images)
Instant cup noodles are on display at the Instant Ramen Museum on April 8, 2008 in Osaka, Japan for the 6th World Instant Noodle Summit. (Junko Kimura/Getty Images)

Get ready to learn everything you've ever wanted to know about instant ramen at Osaka's Cup Noodles Museum.

The museum, just north of Osaka city in Ikeda, celebrates the beloved instant food with quirky displays, interactive exhibits, and live factory demonstrations. Here's what you need to know to experience this wacky niche museum, according to the Japan Today website.

Interactive noodle exhibits: An archway of Nissin Cup Noodle packaging and a larger than life cross-section of one of the infamous cups await visitors inside. Learn the history of this convenient food through the interactive timeline of instant noodles from their inception to the modern-day.

The displays and activities are so visually appealing that you don't even need to understand Japanese to enjoy them!

The real reason most people visit here though is the My CUPNOODLES Factory, which allows visitors to create their own cup with flavors and ingredients of their choice. Select your ramen preferences then watch an assembly line team package it for you.

Before you leave, pop by the Tasting Hall sample limited edition and regional flavors all in one place. Choose what you want directly from the nifty ramen vending machines.

Instant ramen was actually created in Ikeda back in the 1950s, even though the Cup Noodles Museum in Yokohama is more popular.

In 1958, the world's first instant noodle product, Chicken Ramen, was made in a "research shed" in Ikeda. The tiny shack belonged to Taiwanese-Japanese inventor Momofuku Ando, the founder of Nissin. At the time, Nissin was a small and unknown local company.

The invention of Cup Noodles helped families recovering from the aftermath of WWII, afford hot food in addition to just being a breakthrough in modern convenience.

It also helped Japan catch up to the instant food craze that swept the U.S. and other nations in the 1950s.

Now it's a global phenomenon, consumed worldwide by billions every year.

Most Viewed

 
 
Varieties

Japan's Space One Kairos Rocket Fails Minutes after Liftoff

The solid-fuel Kairos rocket by Tokyo-based startup Space One is launched at the company's Spaceport Kii launch pad in Kushimoto, Wakayama Prefecture on December 18, 2024. (Photo by JIJI PRESS / AFP) / Japan OUT
The solid-fuel Kairos rocket by Tokyo-based startup Space One is launched at the company's Spaceport Kii launch pad in Kushimoto, Wakayama Prefecture on December 18, 2024. (Photo by JIJI PRESS / AFP) / Japan OUT
TT
TT

Japan's Space One Kairos Rocket Fails Minutes after Liftoff

The solid-fuel Kairos rocket by Tokyo-based startup Space One is launched at the company's Spaceport Kii launch pad in Kushimoto, Wakayama Prefecture on December 18, 2024. (Photo by JIJI PRESS / AFP) / Japan OUT
The solid-fuel Kairos rocket by Tokyo-based startup Space One is launched at the company's Spaceport Kii launch pad in Kushimoto, Wakayama Prefecture on December 18, 2024. (Photo by JIJI PRESS / AFP) / Japan OUT

Japan's Space One terminated the flight of its Kairos small rocket shortly after liftoff on Wednesday, marking the end of its second attempt in nine months to become the country's first company to deliver a satellite to space.
It is the latest in a series of recent setbacks for Japanese rocket development, even as the government looks to boost the domestic space industry and is targeting 30 rocket launches annually by the early 2030s, Reuters reported.
Authorities are pushing to make Japan Asia's space transportation hub in what they hope will be an 8 trillion yen ($52 billion) space industry.
The second Kairos flight, which only lasted about 10 minutes, was terminated because "the achievement of its mission would be difficult", Space One said in an email to reporters.
Live images from the local Wakayama prefecture government showed the 18-meter (59 ft) solid-propellant rocket blasting off from Spaceport Kii in western Japan at 11:00 a.m. (0200 GMT) but losing stability in its trajectory as it ascended.
Five small satellites, including one from the Taiwan Space Agency, were on board the rocket headed into sun-synchronous orbit roughly 500 km (311 miles) above the Earth's surface.
Tokyo-based Space One was founded in 2018 by Canon Electronics, IHI's aerospace unit, construction firm Shimizu and a state-backed bank, with the goal of launching 20 small rockets a year by 2029 to capture growing satellite launch demand.
At its debut flight in March, Kairos, carrying a Japanese government satellite, exploded five seconds after launch.
Inappropriate flight settings triggered the rocket's autonomous self-destruct system even though no issues were found in its hardware, Space One later said.
A lack of domestic launch options has seen emerging Japanese space startups such as radar satellite maker iQPS and debris mitigator Astroscale tapping on SpaceX's rideshare missions or leading small rocket provider Rocket Lab .
Recent Japanese rocket projects have also faced other setbacks.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) postponed the debut flight of the new solid-fuel launcher Epsilon S after its engine combustion test failed last month for a second time.
JAXA's larger liquid-propellant rocket H3 also failed at its inaugural launch in March 2023 but has succeeded in three flights this year, winning orders from clients such as French satellite giant Eutelsat.
In 2019, Interstellar Technologies became the first Japanese firm to send a rocket into space without a satellite payload, but its orbital launcher Zero is still under development.