Tokyo legend Afuri ramen passed up London, New York and Dubai for their first foreign outpost. Afuri's main requirement? A city with pure, ramen-worthy water. Lucky for us, Portland was at the top of the list. One slurp of the signature yuzu shio broth and you get what the fuss is about: the flavors of gently simmered chicken and dried seafood mingle in a subtle soup steeped with Japanese citrus, which lends each mouthful of noodles a lingering grapefruit tang. But this isn’t just another Japanese ramen chain putting down roots in our town. Afuri is aiming to create a stateside shrine to Japanese food culture in total—ramen and sushi to skewers and sake—the scope of which Portland has not yet seen.