Here’s all the noteworthy noodle news you may have missed in September 2025! Samyang’s newest export product line makes some big changes, Nissin and Maruchan both desperately want to be Buldak, Momofuku teases a new flavor announcement that Target has already spoiled, an update on the shady instant noodle site I reported on a couple months ago, and KPop Demon Hunters noodles are finally available in the US…. sort of! Read on for more details.
Read more: Noodle News Roundup: September 2025Samyang MEP New Flavor and Package Changes
I reported back in March about Samyang’s new product line in the US, MEP, which frankly seems like a pretty loose concept with its Spicy Pentagon approach to flavor. Here we are only 6 months later, and Samyang has already revamped the packaging on the two original flavors, Garlic & Clam and Black Pepper & Beef, to have more of a colorful, shiny foil finish. They’ve also added a third flavor, which looks to be exclusive to the US market, Red Pepper, Chicken & Cilantro. It’s a bit strange to change the packaging design so early in the product line’s existence, but it certainly does make for a flashier appearance on Asian market shelves. At the time of this writing, the official Samyang USA MEP website has not been updated to reflect the new packaging or the new flavor.
Nissin Expands Their Geki Line
If you followed the YouTube channel, you may recall I reviewed Nissin’s first Geki product in the US a little while back, and I thought the flavor was mostly fine but the noodle quality was questionable. While the Geki line has existed in other countries for years, I mentioned at the time that this initial offering in the US was very obviously meant to compete with the ever-popular Samyang Buldak product line. Now, Nissin has seemingly retired the original Fiery Hot Chicken flavor (it’s no longer listed on Nissin’s website, though you might still be able to buy it while stock exists if you liked that flavor) and added Spicy Hot Chicken and Spicy Carbonara Chicken to the product line. One look at the new packaging, and it’s even more obvious that Nissin wants a piece of that Buldak market share, however to their credit, based on the stock images on the website, they do appear to be using different, flatter noodles compared to the original Fiery Hot Chicken flavor’s rounder noodles. If they can nail both the noodle texture and flavor this time, these could be worthy competitors in the spicy noodle space.
Maruchan Quietly Launches a Saucy Noods Product Line
Not surprisingly, Maruchan has also launched a product line clearly designed to compete with Buldak, but the product hasn’t even been officially announced on Maruchan’s website at the time of this writing (way to market your products, Maruchan!). The product line is called Saucy Noods (yes, really), and consists of a Spicy Chicken flavor and a Spicy Creamy Chicken flavor. Just like Nissin’s new Geki products above, one glance at the packaging and you know exactly what market space this is intended to occupy/compete with. Despite not being officially announced, you can currently buy these in bulk at the Amazon links above or in your local supermarket.
Momofuku Teases Major Product Overhauls and New Flavor
Now we can stop talking about Buldak knockoffs and talk about Momofuku instead. My love for this brand has diminished greatly since David Chang’s patent-trolling assholery last year, but their presence in the instant noodle world is prominent, and so I must cover the new developments. As I was writing the other parts of this news post, I got an email from Momofuku saying that their noodle lineup is “getting an upgrade.” Check out the screenshot below:
While they have only teased this announcement officially, it turns out Target has already spoiled both the new look and the new flavor. Big thanks to one of my readers for emailing me and letting me know that Target had this info already! Let’s start with the “new look” and “better taste.” Here’s some screenshots from Target’s website:
As you can see, the packaging has been redesigned, and the product Highlights discuss an upgraded noodle recipe with 20% more sauce per pack. Notice anything conspicuous? They’ve now dropped from 5-packs to 4-packs, and there is no longer any mention of A-Sha on the packaging. The price looks to have dropped slightly – my local Target has these listed at $9.99 currently, which is $2.00 cheaper than the 5-packs – but that $9.99 price point actually averages out to a higher cost per serving now if you do the math. I’m also just speculating here, but does this “upgraded” noodle recipe, coupled with the removal of A-Sha’s logo on the packaging mean that A-Sha is no longer making Momofuku’s noodles? If so, are these going to be better or worse than the original recipe? I’m dying to know what caused this – was it caused by tariffs or an inflated ego or an expired contract or something else? Despite all of my misgivings about some of Momofuku’s sauces, the quality of the noodles was always the highlight of each pack. Could Momofuku really pull off an in-house noodle with A-Sha’s level of quality? I’ll be picking up a pack of the new flavor to find out for myself.
Speaking of the new flavor, here it is, once again thanks to Target selling it ahead of Momofuku’s big announcement:
Yep, I’m surprised by this one too. Ya see, back in Episodes 110 and 111 when I reviewed the last two new varieties from Momofuku (both of which I thought were pretty flavorful compared to the original varieties), the packaging on those confirmed that a Ginger & Scallion flavor was, at that time, seemingly forthcoming. And that made perfect sense at the time, because that’s arguably the noodle dish the Momofuku restaurants are most famous for. So why not make an instant version of their most famous recipe? Turns out, for whatever reason, Momofuku has decided to shelve that variety and proceed with this Sesame Miso variety instead. While I’m puzzled by the decision not to capitalize on their most well-known restaurant offering, I’m certainly not going to complain about Sesame Miso flavored noodles. I’ll try to get a pack for review soon, either here on the site or if I ever have enough free time to get back to the YouTube channel on a regular basis.
Shady Noodles No More
Back in my July news post, I talked about an underhanded company called “Klyra” that I was getting ads for via Facebook. I noticed at the time that the noodles they were selling on their website were photoshopped (or in one case, AI) images of noodles made by other companies, with the original branding removed and the term “Klyra” applied to the product description, implying that they were the manufacturer/distributer. Additionally, they were selling all those noodles at over double the usual price of most retailers. Just go read the original news post so you can see what I’m talking about.
TL;DR while not being outright illegal to resell retail products like noodles, it certainly reeked of an unethical cash-grab. Well, fast-forward to now, and I’m going to take a wild guess that some bad Facebook reviews and maybe a few cease-and-desist letters made their way to the bullshit-artist who runs the “company,” because all mention of noodles has now been completely removed from their site. In its place, they are now selling… handbags. And look, I know absolutely nothing about handbags, but a quick Google Lens search on one of the product images at least to my eyes looks like it’s an exact copy of a Ralph Lauren bag with the logo on the clasp very obviously smudged out, the same way they smudged out the manufacturer names on their noodle package images. Once again, I have to ask: is this legal? Maybe, maybe not – I’m not a lawyer, so I couldn’t say either way, but it definitely looks fishy. If anyone reading this knows how to reach Ralph Lauren’s lawyers, I’m sure they’d love to weigh in on the matter.
KPop Demon Hunters x Nongshim
And finally for this month… I’m not sure if you’ve heard of this small, quiet, independent film called KPop Demon Hunters. Just kidding. It’s a cultural juggernaut from Sony/Netflix. If you’ve been living under a rock, you might not know that the world is currently obsessed with this movie and its music; it’s shattered streaming records, and I don’t think anyone saw its phenomenal success coming because even though the movie came out in June, it’s taken us until September to get any promotional tie-ins sold in the US. Since the movie pretty prominently features instant ramyun, Nongshim seems to have snatched up a collaboration deal where they are featuring limited-time packaging for some of their products featuring images of characters from the movie. For the most part, these are just new packaging for existing products, meaning no new recipes, with one exception. If you head to your local Costco, Walmart, H Mart, or Kroeger, you might find repackaged versions of Shin Ramyun, Shin Black Ramyun, Shin Toomba Ramyun, and Shrimp Crackers, as well as a newly-available Shin Toomba bottled sauce – provided your store hasn’t already been picked clean by scalpers. Sadly, the packaging that mimics the ramyun cups featured in the opening scene of the movie, with Rumi, Zoey, and Mira’s names emblazoned on the front, appears to be a South Korean exclusive, and you’ll find some insanely-priced eBay listings if those are the ones you’re after.
I haven’t written a movie review since my high school newspaper days, but for what it’s worth, I enjoyed the hell out of KPop Demon Hunters. I love the Spider-Verse-esque animation style (not susprising since it is Sony after all), the songs are catchy and well-performed (although I will throw myself out a window if I hear “Soda Pop” one more time), and I found the subtext and allegory regarding the intense societal pressure put on KPop idols in real life to be pretty clever and well-executed. Above all else, my kids love it. It’s gotten them interested in Korean food and KPop music in particular, and while I’m kind of over seeing the movie as much as I have because my kids want to watch it all the time (we even went to the limited-time theatrical release), I love the movie most for how it’s broadened their horizons. Really worth checking out if you’re one of the dozen people who hasn’t seen it yet.
