Way Out There Recipe #2: Hanuda Noodles (from Siren)

Howdy, Jigglers! I'm back with another strange recipe, although I have to tell you, this one contains minimal quantities of gelatin. 

This story begins with a Playstation 2 game named Siren, which is an atmospheric and notoriously slow Japanese survival horror title. At one point in the game, which takes place in a fictional town called Hanuda, you find a note bearing a recipe for a very odd bowl of ramen noodles, and you see a shibito (Siren's version of zombies) policeman chowing down on the selfsame noodles in a cafe.

I love Siren, I love cooking, and I even love ramen, so I knew I had to make this dish. The recipe is as follows (thanks to the Siren Archive Files Guide for the transcription):

Recipe For Hanuda Noodles

      Hanuda Noodles: a local specialty.  Mention Hanuda, and these noodles
      instantly come to mind.  The chewy strands are unsurpassed in firmness
      and texture.  The broth, a delicate melange of sweetness and spiciness, 
      acts as the perfect compliment to the noodles.  How to prepare Hanuda
      Noodles:

           1. Boil noodles for 3 minutes in a large pot of boiling water.
           2. Drain water and rinse noodles well in cold water.
           3. Place noodles in broth made of soup stock, chili, vinegar, sake,
              and sugar.  Top with organic strawberry jam.  Serve with
              seasonal fruits if desired.

This photo is in the game with the recipe

Now, since neither Hanuda nor its firm noodles exist in reality, I subbed in regular ramen

noodles. I of course included the seminal ingredient, strawberry jam, but I also did happen 

to have a cucumber on hand, so I put in a few slices, and ditto for the egg. I did not happen 

to have fresh strawberries, so I omitted them. I cannot positively identify the whitish 

vegetable in the back of the bowl, but it might be the white portion of a green onion, so I 

garnished the bowl with some green onions. It appears that the bowl in the photo was 

garnished with some crushed peanuts, but I omitted that too. Sorry.

The other issue in making this dish was getting the broth right, since it needed to be a

delicate melange and all. I figured I would do this right by starting with a base of homemade

chicken stock (there's the gelatin!), to which I added a hearty splash of sake, several hearty 

dashes of some very hot chili powder, and two dainty splashes of rice vinegar. I completely 

and totally forgot about the sugar in this recipe, but I used a pretty low-grade sake, so it was

plenty sweet regardless. Always taste and adjust seasonings, especially when making oddball 

flavor combinations!

Other than a few ingredient substitutions, I made the recipe as written, even managing to

soft-boil an egg perfectly, which I can almost never do. And the taste was...alright, actually.

I probably overdid the chili powder, but the sweetness of the jam cut it nicely, and the

broth itself was so good that my husband told me I need to make regular ramen with it. Even

the onion didn't clash with the rest of the flavors. The only main problem was that the jam

bascially overpowers the other elements of the dish when you get a bite with jam. Maybe

it's because I didn't use organic strawberry jam, or maybe it wouldn't have been quite so

sweet with homemade jam, but it didn't ruin the noodles regardless.

I ended up thinking I would probably eat this outside of novelty purposes, but my husband

disagreed. Regardless, it was a pleasure getting to taste test such an odd recipe from such a

beloved-but-odd story. Thanks, Project Siren, for your culinary contributions to the world!