Airline Cup Noodle - Ramen de Sky and Soba de Sky Review

When I went to the Nissin Cup Noodle Museum in Yokohama I bought these cute little miniature cup noodles in the gift shop.  The gift shop at the museum is packed full of instant ramen souvenirs and also has some specialty varieties of noodles you don't usually find in supermarkets.

The little half-size cup noodles I bought are noodles prepared by Nissan for Japan Airlines (JAL) as snacks on their flights.  They give them a fancy French sounding name as SOBA de SKY and RAMEN de SKY too.  These noodles are labelled as JAL Original Noodle Snack and as JAL Selections.  Nissin would have specially formulated these noodles to taste good in the thinner, drier air on a plane at high altitude.  Not too long ago, I did see a Youtube channel review one of these on a ZIPAIR flight, a low cost subsidiary of JAL.

There are a number of different flavours and I only picked two to carry home.  I'm not sure what class you need to fly to get these, but I know I didn't get them in economy years ago, when I flew JAL.  Air Canada, years ago, did serve up cup noodles as a snack in economy on the flights to Hong Kong, but I don't think they were specially formulated for flying.  In Japan, you can find these different nack sized noodle cups in some supermarkets too and they are often sold in like a six pack of different types of noodles.

I picked a ramen and a soba noodle to try as the two kinds of noodle soups have different soup bases, noodles, and flavour profiles.  I have included a photo below of a regular sized cup noodle compared to these little half-sized cups.  They really are only snack-sized.

Noodle cup size comparison.

SOBA de SKY

This is basically soba (buckwheat) noodles in a dashi based broth with a number of different toppings.  The graphic design is very clean with the cup having a white background colour scheme with a nice forest green band across the middle showing the name of the noodles in Japanese and English.  The white background has a repeat motif of planes and the words "SOBA de SKY."  The bottom part of the cup shows what the soba noodles look like in closeup.  The colouring on this cup definitely pops more than the rich yellow of the ramen cup.

3/4 View of the noodle cup.

View of the lid of the cup.

View of the front of the cup.

Allergens, bar code, and manufacturer's information.

Ingredients, preparation instructions and warnings.  They really compressed stuff to make it fit on the side without resorting to teeny fonts.

Nutritional information.

Peeling back the lid shows the brown buckwheat noodles, lots of green onion, some fish cake and tempura bits.

I filled it with boiling water, closed the lid and waited three minutes to see this delicious looking sight.

This instant soba noodle had a savoury, slightly seafoody umami, dashi broth that was a bit saltier than normal.  Increased salt helps to enhance the flavour in the thinner, dry air of the airplane cabin.  I really enjoyed the soup and noodles which had the slightly nuttier chew of buckwheat and a clean break to them.  The toppings seems to be plentiful for this cup with lots of green onion, tempura, and fish cake.  This was a tasty soba noodle snack - you only wish you had more!

Closeup of the noodles.

RAMEN de SKY

This is basically your regular instant noodles in a shoyu (soy sauce) based broth with a number of different toppings.  The graphic design is very clean with the cup having a white background colour scheme with a golden yellow band across the middle showing the name of the noodles in Japanese and English.  The white background has a repeat motif of planes and the words "RAMEN de SKY."  The bottom part of the cup shows what the ramen noodles look like in closeup.  The colouring on this cup is bright and cheerful, but the background images are harder to see because they are yellow.

3/4 view.

Lid of the cup.

Front view of the cup.  You can see all of the expected toppings.

Allergens, bar code, and manufacturer's information.

Ingredients, preparation directions and warnings.

Nutritional information.

Peeling the lid back shows the regular instant noodles with soup base and some toppings which are bits of pork, green onion, menma, fish cake, and corn.

I filled it with boiling water, closed the lid and waited three minutes to see the rehydrated noodles.  Some of the toppings had fallen to the underside of the noodle block.

This instant soba noodle had a standard tasting shoyu broth that was also bit saltier than normal.  Increased salt helps to enhance the flavour in the thinner, dry air of the airplane cabin.  The flavour of the soup was quite good with that soy sauce type aroma to it.  The noodles had a good bite and chew to them and it was a good cup of noodles.  There was a decent amount of toppings seems to be plentiful for this cup with bits of green onion, pork slices, fish cake, corn, and menma scattered throughout. You wouldn't go wrong if you had this on the plane.

Closeup of the noodles.

Conclusion

Out of the two kinds of noodles, I would choose the soba over the ramen. The soba seemed more visually appealing and tasty to me, so it would be more of a treat on the flight.  Both kinds of noodle soup would be tasty, warm, pick-me-ups on a flight.  The soups would help you stay hydrated on the plane and who wouldn't like cup noodle!

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