udon top

I have a minor confession to make: I’m really not a fan of udon noodles. When asked to rank the big three – namely ramen, soba and udon – I’ll give my answer from most to least liked in that exact order. Ramen is quite frankly the man and hard to go wrong with, and soba is, although far simpler, nearly always delicious even hot or cold. But udon I just can’t seem to make friends with. Far heavier than its other noodle brethren, I find myself tiring of udon’s flavour even halfway through a meal, and those thick, heavy wheat-flour noodles slip from my chopsticks and splash into my soup. Every. Single. Time.

But these awesome new gelatinous “gummy” udon noodles, I think I could handle.

We have no idea what they taste like, but these new “noodles” certainly look very cool. Packaged just like a box of genuine uncooked wheat-flour noodles, these udon men gummy (pronounced “gumi” thanks to some dodgy gairaigo conventions) noodles are sure to please Japanophiles the world over. And thanks to their natural-looking colour, they’re also ideal for White Day, when men who were fortunate enough to receive a gift on Valentine’s Day return the favour, usually with some form of white-coloured confection.

▼ Sold in a stylish omiyage box they don’t look too cheap either

udon 2

▼ But the gummy noodles look so realistic she may be kind of confused at first

udon 1

udon 4

▼ The long noodles are made to be broken in half, so your sweet can pretend to have the stomach the size of a walnut by nibbling rather than gorging on them while you’re around udon 3

These sweet, gelantinous udon noodles are on sale now and cost 380 yen (US$3.70) per 60g pack. Head over to Rakuten (Japanese only, sorry) for more info.

Source/images: Rakuten via IT Media