> But a directory topic "instant noodles" would find sites about instant noodles. And sure enough, if you hunt through search results, you can find things like https://www.theramenrater.com/ which definitely fits the bill, but it takes some hunting. It's a "page four" type of result (in reality, it was on page five).

Your example of Ramen Rater is the #1 result for the query [instant noodle reviews]. The more broad [instant noodles] has Wikipedia as the #1 result, which covers the "about" intent case you mentioned.