Momofuku Ando, 96, Dies; Invented Instant Ramen - New York Times

Momofuku Ando, 96, Dies; Invented Instant Ramen - New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/09/business/worldbusiness/09ando.h...

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Momofuku Ando, 96, Dies; Invented Instant Ramen More Articles in Business »

By DENNIS HEVESI MOST POPULAR Published: January 9, 2007 E-MAIL E-MAILED BLOGGED SEARCHED

PRINT Momofuku Ando, who — to the delight of dormitory students and 1. Modern Love: What Shamu Taught Me About a other kitchen-resistant customers worldwide — invented those small REPRINTS Happy Marriage 2. Anywhere the Eye Can See, It’s Likely to See an Ad packets of preflavored dried noodles that require just a three-minute SAVE boil, died Friday at a hospital in Osaka, Japan. Mr. Ando, the founder 3. Questions Couples Should Ask (Or Wish They Had) SHARE Before Marrying of the Nissin Food Products Company, was 96. 4. Op-Ed Contributor: The Mentally Ill, Behind Bars 5. Digital Domain: Want an iPhone? Beware the Enlarge This Image The cause was heart failure, said Larry iHandcuffs Lampel, the company’s senior resources 6. Fitness: When It’s O.K. to Run Hurt manager at its American headquarters 7. Guangzhou Journal: In City Ban, a Sign of Wealth and Its Discontents in Gardena, Calif. 8. U.S. and Iraqis Are Wrangling Over War Plans 9. New York Rabbi Finds Friends in Iran and Enemies at Starting with the chicken-broth noodles in cellophane bags Home that Mr. Ando first concocted in a shack behind his house 10. Study Detects a Gene Linked to Alzheimer’s

in Ikeda, Japan, 49 years ago, Nissin now produces 16 Go to Complete List » flavors of what it calls Top Ramen and Cup Noodles. Besides six varieties of chicken, they include beef, shrimp, vegetable and spicy chili.

Kyodo News, via Associated Press The company sold 46.3 billion packs and cups around the Momofuku Ando in 2005. world last year, earning $131 million in profits. nytimes.com/tech

Related In 1958, Mr. Ando — virtually penniless after a credit Appreciations: Mr. Noodle association he served as chairman went bankrupt — began experimenting with ways to prepare flavored noodles by simply adding hot water.

The idea stemmed from an experience a decade earlier, when Japan was still ravaged by Get highlights from CES and Macworld on the new blog Bits postwar poverty. In “The Story of the Invention of Instant Ramen,” an autobiography Also in Technology: published in 2002, Mr. Ando told of walking through the rubble-strewn streets of Osaka. Apple introduces the new iPhone The ultimate iPhone FAQs “I happened to pass this area and saw a line 20, 30 meters long in front of a dimly lit stall Les Moonves on the digital future of CBS from which clouds of steam were steadily rising,” he wrote. “People dressed in shabby clothes shivered in the cold while waiting for their turn. The person who was with me said they were lined up for a bowl of ramen.” ADVERTISEMENTS “I realized that people were willing to wait patiently just for a bowl of ramen,” he said. Scottrade: More than $7 Trades. It’s Called Ordinary unflavored noodles were not the solution; Mr. Ando insisted that his noodles be Value & We Value You. tasty, inexpensive and easy to prepare. The problem was flavoring them without making them mushy. Using a secondhand noodle-making machine and a large wok, Mr. Ando sprinkled soup on the noodles with a watering can, then kneaded and loosened them by hand after letting them partly dry. “This allowed the noodles to soak up the soup on the outer layer,” he wrote. “I then dried the noodles so they would keep longer and could be

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easily prepared with boiling water.” Men's Denim Authentic Pigment-Dyed Box Hood Born on March 5, 1910, in Taiwan while it was under Japanese occupation, Mr. Ando was Buy Now a son of Japanese parents who had moved there from Osaka. When he was 23, he returned to Japan and, while a student at Ritsumeikan University, ran several clothing companies. In 1948, he started a company that produced salt; it changed its name to Nissin 10 years later. He is survived by his wife, Masako, two sons and a daughter.

Chicken was the prime ingredient in Nissin’s global success. “By using chicken soup, instant ramen managed to circumvent religious taboos when it was introduced in different countries,” Mr. Ando wrote. “Hindus may not eat beef and Muslims may not eat pork, but there is not a single culture, religion or country that forbids the eating of chicken.”

Nissin opened its first overseas operation, in California, in 1970. Besides Japan, it has plants in Hong Kong, Indonesia, India, Brazil, Mexico, Peru, Singapore, China, the Philippines, Thailand, Hungary and Germany as well as in Lancaster, Pa.

In July 2005, the company vacuum-packed portions of instant noodles so that a Japanese astronaut, Soichi Noguchi, could have them on the space shuttle Discovery. Mr. Ando said at the time, “I’ve realized my dream that noodles can go into space.”