Nissin Tonkotsu Seafood Big Cup Noodle Review

Nissin Japan has had several different variants of Seafood Big Cup Noodle in the last few years.  This Tonkotsu Seafood Big Cup Noodle is a limited time variant for the winter of 2023-2024. The Nissin HK Seafood Cup Noodle is easy to find in Canada at Chinese supermarkets, but not the Japanese version, so it was a surprise to find this on the shelf.  The Hong Kong version is similar to the one in Japan, but every regional version usually tastes at least a little different too.  I quite like the regular seafood version and really enjoy the Hong Kong Curry Seafood Noodle version too, but I thought a pork version both interesting and possibly a little odd for an already tasty dish with the savoury flavours of the sea.

3/4 view of the cup.  You can see it shows the tasty topping on the lid and it has the general graphic design of a regular seafood noodle cup with the blue SEAFOOD letters.  The characters for tonkotsu or pork bone broth are added above.

The lid has the new design with the two tabs that fold down to hold the lid shut after you add boiling water.  They look like cat ears! It replaced the little piece of tape that used to be on the bottom of the cup to help you peel off the shrink wrap.

Front of the cup wit the classic SEAFOOD logo.  It's always been blue for the sea.

Top of the cup.  It shows the slices of octopus, cabbage, simulated crab leg, fluffy egg bits, and green onion in a thick soup.  Tonkoksu broths are thicker and creamier.

Back of the cup with BIG letters.  Shows ingredients, directions, and then allergens in the bottom right.

Warnings for preparation.  DO NOT MICROWAVE.  Lots of USA noodles can sometimes be nuked, the Asian ones use boiled water!

Allergens

Warning icons and nutritional info.  More fat in these noodles probably to make it thicker and creamier.

The dried contents of the noodle cup.  You can see the pieces of egg, octopus, cabbage, green onion, and crab stick.  Lots of soup powder.

When I first opened the package I didn't get any pork meat smells, just the light fishy smell of the seafood soup powder.  Nissin indicated that the soup is supposed be creamy and tasty by mixing one delicious flavour with another delicious flavour.  There was more soup powder than normal though.  The noodles are just your regular noodles found in Cup Noodle.

After adding in boiling water and waiting 3 minutes for everything to rehydrate, I peeled the lid back to be met with the mild aroma of a tonkotsu broth.  Definitely stir this soup to make sure all of the powder is mixed in well.  Tonkotsu broth sometimes don't have a heavy pork or meaty taste to them as they lean towards a thicker or creamy texture that is rich in umami flavour.  This comes from the insides of the bones.  I suspect the tonkotsu elements help to offset the "sea" flavour and smell of the soup while adding the richness and creaminess to it.  I'd say it tasted like the salt and umami of the sea tempered with the richness of pork bone broth.  It did taste pretty good and I was glad I had bought several of these cups while they were available.  The soup was definitely thicker than the regular broth which is soupy.  This noodle cup gets a two thumbs up!

Shot of the finished noodle soup.

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