Asuka/Shibuya亜寿加/渋谷

 

Two great tastes that taste great together - tsukemen and tonkatsu (deep fried pork cutlet). Asuka is a shop that was recently written up in Ikkojin as one of the top 10 ramen shops in Shibuya, in fact it was first on their list. It's on the same side of the street and the same side of Shibuya station as the Cerulean Tower Hotel. You would use the Shibuya station South Exit (same side as Hachiko Exit but south of it) and then go up the stairs to your left and over road (under the highway). Wadachi above was number 10 on Ikkojin's list as a matter of fact. So one of Asuka's signature dishes is a rich dan-dan men with a large (but thin) tonkatsu slice in it. The breading on the tonkatsu slice is fine grained like Tonki, not course-grained like Saboten. This idea of putting tonkatsu in dan-dan men is similar to GSTA-MEN in Kanda. Wait of about 5 people/10 minutes on a Sunday afternoon 2 PM. No ticket machine, orders are placed to the waitress running around and then you'll pay the man behind the counter when you leave. I ended up having the tonkatsu tsukemen with shoyu broth. You get a decent-width tonkatsu slice that is well-done, but as I said it's a bit thin. The shoyu dipping broth was fairly salty but good, with a generous amount of onions in it. The noodles were decent but average, they also included a clump of cooked seaweed and crunchy menma. All-in-all very satisfying, the tonkatsu and noodles were a good balance between each other.

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