Is 7-Eleven's "Chilled Pepper Soba" Really as Salty as Seawater? Ryuji Taste-Tests It and Remakes It at Home

According to Ryuji, so much information about this pepper soba had come their way before they even tried it that they already felt "full." Among the opinions sent in was one saying it was "like eating seawater," and it was said to be "so salty it's not even in the same league" as the "SUSURU" product that had previously drawn attention for its saltiness. Ryuji also mentions comments about Ramen Walker, the supervisor, saying things like "they've eaten so much ramen that their taste buds are broken."

The nutrition label lists 8.0g of salt, and Ryuji says the much-discussed "SUSURU" product had about 6.2g. Ryuji also observes that the complaints about saltiness are mostly concentrated on the chilled products.

First up was the Chilled Iekei Ramen. It's 728 kcal, with 300g of noodles. When the container was opened, a large amount of chopped garlic was included as a separate add-on, which surprised the whole staff. The soup contains vegetable oil, and the noodles lean toward the flat style reminiscent of iekei ramen. A little nori is placed on top as a finishing touch. The price is 594 yen, and Ryuji's take was, "About 600 yen, so I guess that's normal." The salt content is about 6.1g.

First, the staff tasted it without hearing Ryuji's opinion. Their impressions were "All I can taste is garlic," "It's salty," and "It's not good," so the reception was poor.

Ryuji's own impression was that it "tastes like you dumped in all the garlic they keep on the counter at an iekei shop." It certainly captures the iekei feel, but there's too much garlic. Ryuji pointed out that rather than designing it so you add all the included garlic, it would be better to adjust the amount from the start. Still, they said it wasn't inedible. The staff also said that the garlic was so strong they couldn't really taste the saltiness. Ryuji interpreted this as the garlic masking the saltiness.

The rating was "B minus." Iekei ramen is salty to begin with, so that aspect was captured well. Ryuji also gave credit for the effort to recreate an iekei-style soup. On the other hand, there was an opinion that it might not need to be chilled, and that regular iekei ramen would be fine. Ryuji was understanding, noting that there are no chilled iekei shops, so trying to make one results in an entirely new flavor, which must be difficult.

Next came the main event, the pepper soba. It's cheaper than the iekei ramen, at 570 kcal. The ingredients are things like soy sauce and pepper, with nothing special included. The contents are just noodles and green onion. The soup uses vegetable oil. Ryuji explained that animal fat would solidify when cold, which is probably why they used vegetable oil. There is pepper at the bottom of the container as well, and quite a lot of it. The noodles are thinner than the iekei ones, and there was also the view that the salt would cling to them easily.

Ryuji said, "Complaining without eating it is not OK, you absolutely have to eat it before you complain," and then tasted it. The staff's reaction was "It's about as salty as SUSURU." Ryuji's assessment was that "SUSURU is nothing compared to how salty this is." One staff member started to say "Maybe the second bite isn't so bad," but Ryuji rejected that: "It's totally salty." That staff member said it might be because they'd been sweating on the way there, which got a laugh. Ryuji joked that it would be fine if you picked at it one noodle at a time while drinking.

Ryuji's verdict was that the iekei ramen landed at B because you could finish it, but this one was inedible.

For those who still want to eat it, Ryuji tried several remedies.

The first was to add a large amount of white pepper. Regular table pepper would make it too spicy, but white pepper has a milder heat, so it "glitches" your sense of taste and makes it edible. The reasoning was that adding the wrong seasoning would make it even saltier. However, the staff found it spicy and hard to handle, and some reacted that as a strategy it was actually rather painful.

Next was egg and sesame oil. Ryuji said this was "good," but the staff, after a silence, answered, "It's salty." Ryuji explained the difference by saying that after eating something bad, eating something only slightly bad probably makes it taste good.

Ryuji's explanation is that adding plenty of oil coats the noodles, making it harder for the salt to hit your tongue directly. It becomes something like aburasoba, but Ryuji laughed, "I think aburasoba is fine." They added, however, that the oil in the original product isn't sesame oil.

In the final assessment, Ryuji rated it "inedible," with the caveat that masking it with sesame oil makes it at least somewhat edible.

On top of that, half-jokingly, Ryuji floated a theory: perhaps Ramen Walker deliberately created a polarizing flavor to stir up buzz on X (formerly Twitter). "SUSURU" also became a big topic, and everyone fell for it and bought it. But this is even saltier than that—"This is seawater," Ryuji says.

Ryuji also expressed dissatisfaction with the price. Charging nearly 500 yen for just noodles, soy sauce, green onion, and pepper is expensive, and they called it "kind of a rip-off." For those who absolutely want to eat it, adding sesame oil and an egg makes it not inedible, but it still isn't good. In that case, Ryuji suggested, you'd be better off buying Chinese-style noodles sold at 7-Eleven, such as the ones for miso ramen, rinsing them in cold water, and eating them with soy sauce and Ajinomoto.

Ryuji said that, as things stood, anyone who ate this pepper soba would never eat pepper soba again, and they wanted to rescue that, so they made their own pepper soba as "rescue cooking." They also said, "I want to rescue Ramen Walker."

To match the original product, the only topping is green onion. About 25g, thinly sliced into rounds, is used. Ryuji believes the original product uses a ramen soup base. Since it's a soy sauce ramen base, the soy sauce is kept to 2½ teaspoons. Given that the product was criticized for being salty and caused this much of an uproar, Ryuji doesn't make it too salty.

As for oil, there was quite a lot floating on the original product, but it didn't smell of sesame oil. So about 2½ teaspoons of rice bran oil is used. The judgment is that the noodles taste better coated with about this much.

About 10 shakes of coarsely ground black pepper go in. At this stage, the aim is less for aroma and more to dissolve the pepper into the sauce. Thinking that a soy sauce ramen would likely have a niboshi (dried sardine) flavor, Ryuji adds 1/3 teaspoon of iriko dashi. It serves to add a ramen-like flavor, and if you don't have it, granulated Japanese dashi is fine. Then 1/3 teaspoon of chicken bouillon, 4 shakes of Ajinomoto, and 1/4 teaspoon of sugar go in. Mirin can be used instead of sugar. When mixed, the sauce thickens slightly and looks close to the original pepper soba. Three shakes of garlic powder are also added, but Ryuji explains that because so much pepper goes in, the garlic is strictly a supporting player.

For the noodles, Topvalu medium-thick noodles were boiled for 3 minutes. In Ryuji's view, chilled Chinese-style noodles are too slippery to begin with, and they've never thought they were good. Ryuji also shared their personal belief that if you're going to chill them, firm, "bashi-bashi" noodles like Jiro-style ones are better, since even chilled noodles keep their texture.

The bowl is chilled in the freezer in advance. The boiled noodles are rinsed in cold water, but ice water is better if you have it. Squeeze out the water thoroughly so the sauce doesn't get diluted. In the chilled bowl, mix the noodles and sauce like aburasoba, then top with the green onion. Be careful not to use too much green onion, as it makes it pungent. Finally, finish with a generous amount of coarsely ground black pepper. Ryuji estimates the ingredient cost at about 100 yen per serving, or 200 yen even if you make double. The salt content is said to be less than half that of the original product.

The staff who ate the finished dish reacted with "It's good" and "It definitely feels like pepper soba." Ryuji emphasized that it's not aburasoba but properly pepper soba. Ryuji also rated it "Hey, this is good," saying the flavor direction is quite similar to the original product.

From there, Ryuji speculated that the original product must have tasted good at the prototype stage, and that something must have gone wrong. The idea behind their own recipe is to keep the salt modest, mellow it out with niboshi and sugar, and soften the saltiness with umami seasoning. They added that no special seasonings were used at all. The staff also commented that although there's quite a lot of pepper, it isn't too spicy.

Finally, Ryuji shared their thoughts on convenience store food in general. Ryuji also supervises convenience store products, but believes that "really good for a convenience store" is the ceiling. Basically, homemade is better, and the reason their own supervised products get harsh feedback is that people say "your recipe is better." Ryuji says the staff are also very tough on convenience store food, probably because they usually cook from Ryuji's recipes. Ryuji clarified that this isn't self-praise.

At the same time, Ryuji believes it should be possible to make more products that are good as convenience store food. Convenience store food 10 or 20 years ago was barely edible, but now there are decent products like the recent biryani. Today's convenience store food exists because they've collected real data with products like these and kept improving them to make them tastier, so challenges like this one shouldn't stop, Ryuji said. There was also talk that eating it with an onigiri might soften the saltiness and make it just right.

Ryuji encouraged viewers to actually try 7-Eleven's pepper soba and iekei ramen. And if they feel something's off, Ryuji concluded, they should try the Ryuji-style version, which can be made simply by boiling noodles and tossing them with seasonings.