Starting from scratch, our founder Hidehito Uki made his way to Hawai`i from Japan's Tochigi prefecture back in 1981. All he had was a suitcase and a noodle machine, but he was on a mission—to bring the best Japanese noodles to everyone. Day in, day out, he hustled, going door to door, giving out fresh noodle samples, and tweaking them to suit each chef's taste.