Sapporo ramen heritage and Men-Eiji's modern voice

Sapporo's winter air carries more than snow. It carries the smell of pork bones simmering for hours, of miso paste melting into rendered fat, of seafood stock turning cloudy with collagen. Ramen, as the city makes it, was born from the need to warm a body fast and feed it well in a climate that drops below minus ten. That heritage still shapes every bowl served in the city today, and Men-Eiji carries that lineage forward with a gyokai-tonkotsu broth that nods to both the sea and the land behind Hokkaido's food culture.

Behind the brand sits Jun Furukawa, a chef who trained across Japan before settling on a broth philosophy that fuses pork bones with seafood. The brand operates MEN-EIJI Hiragishi BASE and Duck Ramen EIJI, two locations in central and south Sapporo, and has staged pop-ups from Bangkok to Berlin over the past several years. Australian diners in Sydney and Melbourne have followed the brand's progress through social media and travel food press, which has raised questions about authenticity, ingredient sourcing and what the future might hold for regional Japanese ramen on Australian shores.

Cold winters, hot bowls: the birth of Sapporo ramen

The story usually begins in the 1950s, when ramen had already spread across Japan but Hokkaido remained the coldest, hungriest frontier. A vendor named Morito Omori, working at a stall called Aji no Sanpei in Sapporo's Susukino district, reportedly began ladling miso paste into his broth around 1954 or 1955. The result was thicker, oilier and more intensely savoury than the clear shoyu bowls common in Tokyo at the time. Miners, students and taxi drivers queued for it after late shifts, and the miso ramen of Sapporo entered the national imagination within a decade.

Hokkaido's geography pushed the dish in this direction from the start. Wheat thrived on the island, giving the region strong flour and dedicated noodle makers who could pull and cut fresh batches daily. Dairy was abundant, which meant butter and corn became standard toppings alongside bean sprouts. The broth itself often combined pork back fat with local miso, producing a layer of richness that stood up to long, freezing evenings. Visitors arriving in Sapporo during February's Snow Festival quickly learned to seek out steaming bowls as the first line of defence against the cold.

By the late twentieth century, miso ramen had become the city's calling card, but Sapporo also developed strong shio and shoyu traditions, as well as a fondness for buttered corn, seafood toppings and even curry-flavoured broths in some neighbourhoods. The bowl evolved from a single street-vendor experiment into a regional identity, one that chefs like Jun Furukawa would later reinterpret rather than copy. That interpretive streak is the thread that connects the 1950s stalls to today's gyokai-tonkotsu kitchens.

Regional styles at a glance

Sapporo sits within a wider Japanese broth vocabulary, and understanding the differences helps explain why a gyokai-tonkotsu bowl feels distinct on the tongue. The four classic families are shio (salt), shoyu (soy sauce), miso and tonkotsu (pork bone), with seafood-based gyokai styles sitting alongside or layered into them. Men-Eiji's house broth belongs to the layered end of this spectrum, pulling depth from two traditions at once.

Broth family Base ingredient Typical colour Common Sapporo pairing
Shio Salt, clear dashi Pale gold Light seafood toppings
Shoyu Soy sauce, chicken or pork stock Dark amber Chashu, nori, spring onion
Miso Fermented soybean paste Cloudy brown Butter, corn, bean sprouts
Tonkotsu Pork bones, long simmer Milky white Garlic, ginger, black pepper
Gyokai-tonkotsu Pork bones plus dried and fresh seafood Opaque ivory Scallop oil, niboshi, pork

Men-Eiji combines the collagen-rich depth of pork bones with the briny sweetness of niboshi, katsuobushi and scallop, a method that takes longer to clarify than a standard miso broth. The result is a soup that reads both rich and clean, a quality that has become a quiet benchmark for chefs experimenting with regional Hokkaido flavours. Diners who try the bowl often note that it carries weight without feeling heavy, an effect that comes from the careful balance of fat, salt and umami layered through the simmering process.

Jun Furukawa and the birth of Men-Eiji

Jun Furukawa trained in Tokyo before moving north, a path that runs against the usual flow of Japanese chefs and signals an early willingness to question convention. He spent years refining a broth that could hold its own against the established miso houses without copying them, and opened MEN-EIJI Hiragishi BASE in central Sapporo to test the idea with local diners. The brand's second venue, Duck Ramen EIJI, expands the concept with duck-based variations that share the same depth-first broth philosophy while opening a different animal profile.

The brand's approach to noodles has drawn attention from industry watchers and home cooks alike. Furukawa has spoken about offering both thick and thin noodle options in the same service, a choice that reflects the broth's layered character rather than a marketing compromise. A detailed note on that decision appears on the Men-Eiji noodle philosophy page, which explains how each cut interacts with the gyokai-tonkotsu base and why both belong on the same menu.

Recognition followed the kitchen work. Men-Eiji received a Michelin Bib Gourmand in the Hokkaido guide, placing it among the recommended ramen destinations for travellers planning a Sapporo trip. International pop-ups followed the award, including events in cities with strong Japanese dining scenes across Europe and Asia. Furukawa treats these appearances less as expansion and more as conversation, a way to learn how the broth reads outside Hokkaido and which flavour notes survive translation when ingredients travel thousands of kilometres from their origin.

Crossing borders: from Hokkaido to Australia

Australian diners have engaged with regional Japanese cuisine more deliberately in the past decade, with Sydney and Melbourne leading the interest. Inner-city suburbs such as Surry Hills, Chippendale and Carlton host dozens of Japanese restaurants, several dedicated to ramen, and the growth of Japanese grocery imports through FSANZ-compliant supply chains has made regional ingredients more accessible in Australia. Time zone differences work in Australia's favour too: a pop-up announced at noon in Sapporo reaches Sydney readers before the dinner reservation hour, which has helped brands build genuine followings without permanent local outlets.

Men-Eiji has appeared at events in Sydney and explored collaborations with Melbourne-based chefs, an exchange shaped by the strong Japanese-Australian tourism and trade relationship. Import regulations in Australia require strict labelling and origin documentation for meat and seafood, so any long-term presence would require navigating those rules carefully. The brand's international site documents these collaborations and offers visitors a window into how the broth travels and which ingredients survive the journey best.

Why Australian diners connect with the bowl

A bowl that keeps evolving

The current Men-Eiji menu reflects years of refinement rather than reinvention. The signature gyokai-tonkotsu bowl remains the centrepiece, served with house-made chashu, scallion oil and a choice of noodle thickness that lets the diner steer the texture. Duck Ramen EIJI offers a duck-and-seafood variation that leans on confit-style meat and a slightly lighter broth, giving the brand a second voice without diluting the original broth philosophy that earned the Bib Gourmand recognition.

Details that set a Men-Eiji bowl apart

These small choices add up over many visits. A bowl that started as a single broth experiment in a Susukino stall has grown into a quiet international reference point, carried forward by chefs who treat the soup as a craft rather than a commodity. The story of Sapporo ramen is still being written, and Men-Eiji is one of the pens still moving.

The next step for curious Australian diners is simple. A short flight from Sydney or Brisbane via Tokyo or one of the seasonal direct routes puts Sapporo within reach for a long weekend, and Men-Eiji's two locations sit within easy access of central hotels. Those who cannot travel yet can follow the brand's pop-up calendar on its official pages, where announcements usually arrive well ahead of the event and tickets open to Australian residents alongside local diners. Either way, the broth waits, simmering somewhere between sea and soil, ready to be tasted at its source.