From dusk till midnight, office workers in suits and tourists in T-shirts crowd Fukuoka's open-air food stalls to perch on benches and slurp steaming pork-bone broth with thin, yellow noodles.
Hakata ramen, a specialty of Kyushu, is popular for its firm, chewy noodles made with high-protein wheat flour milled from grain grown in the U.S., Canada and Australia. Higher global prices have hit noodle sellers hard.
"Rising wheat and energy costs are hurting our business as we can't pass on the increases through higher ramen prices," said Yasutomo Yamagami, ladling soup into large bowls, for which he charges ¥500 each. Vendors in the port city keep prices as low as possible to win customers.