“I got a Line message from my father…” So began a Twitter post from はるかごんё (Harukagonё) (@harukagon514), whose dad had just sent her these pictures of a bowl of ramen.

Harukagonё’s dad was about to tuck into a tasty bowl of noodles when he noticed that his soft-boiled egg was ‘smiling’ at him.

Harukagonё’s dad said that the egg looked a bit like a beluga whale, while his daughter thought it looked like a ray.

Harukagonё’s post attracted plenty of attention from Twitter users, with more than 311,000 "likes" and 92,000 retweets at the time of writing.

“It's too cute to eat!” commented one user.

“Hilarious! The moment I saw this picture, I couldn’t help blowing out the drink I had in my mouth,” wrote another.

“It's a ramen fairy! Such a comforting sight...” went another.

Harukagonё’s egg certainly bears a striking resemblance to a smiling face. What’s more, it brought a smile to the faces of the thousands of people who saw the pictures he posted. Only one of them got to eat the egg though!

Bon Appetit Harukagonё-san!