Toshoumen Seian Hansou/Gotanda刀削麺 西安飯荘/五反田

In Gotanda, down the street next to the Mitsubishi MUFJ bank across from the west exit (the one with the Seijo Ishii) of Gotanda station, is Toshoumen Seian Hanso. I will submit that this is the best toshoumen place on the lower left side of the loop. This place filled up quickly on a Saturday night, we were waiting at door for the opening at 5:30, and there were 2-3 tables reserved by the time we got in. They have various toshoumens, including the quite spicy red one, regular dan-dan toshoumen, yasai toshoumen, chashu toshoumen, etc. Also they have a special spicy red sauce sliced-chicken dish (垂涎鶏) and many other things on an interesting Szechuan-style menu, many dishes claim to be from Xi'an. The proprietor is very friendly and he and the staff will speak Japanese very slowly and understandably to you if you ask them - they long cylindrical tetsu nabe gyozas (ジュージュー鉄鍋ギョーザ) are very good and have a taste not always found in other gyozas. The toshomen can be shared by two people. It had very fresh chewy noodles and the broth is quite rich, it doesn't taste like some powdered togarashis were tossed into a pot of chicken broth. Also included are ground pork and string beans. Right next door is a regular Chinese place, I don't know if they are related or not - but this place seems good enough - many interesting things on the menu, including some crab soups, chinese hot pot, etc. Prices were pretty cheap - a side, the gyozas, shorompo, the soup and the chicken, plus two asahi chu bins for 4500 yen. Not too shabby.

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Choya/Ebisu張家/恵比寿

 

This darts bar in Ebisu is now newly offering a special toshoumen. Not clear why a place like this would be offering this, especially when there's a Chinmar-ya practically around the corner. This place is down the street from Teras, a place that serves an excellent Indonesian bibimbap-like rice and egg dish in a bowl. This toshoumen was kind of watery, and the chashu tasted like it was from the supermarket. On the plus side they do have omori sizes though. This place has a 580 yen toshoumen special through the end of Feb, with a large omori portion for another 200 yen. Not many people in the place at 12:30 on a Monday. Funnily enough, the proprietor saw us examining the menu at the bottom of the stairs and came out to convince us to come in. A large amount of fresh garlic and cabbetsu in the middle of the bowl so there was a slight Jiro vibe going on there. They also have some regular teishokus including fried chicken etc., their menu is at the home page link below. Overall the portion was s bit small though, the omori was necessary to being it up to a regular size portion. Also this place is behind Kimukatsu, a tonkatsu place that receives rave reviews but I think is not significantly better than Saboten (and there's a another tonkatsu place right next to Kimkatsu also...

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Ramen Zero/ShimoMeguroラーメンゼロ/下目黒

The early February 2009 meeting of the Ramen Lovers Club convened at the relatively new Ramen Zero, about 3-4 mins walk north of Tokyu Fudomae Station, or about 15 mins walk west from JR Meguro Station, if you take this path past the Meguro Gajoen then be prepared for a steep down hill. Well this place has gotten a lot of press recently and was more often than not been featured in the first few pages, the prime real estate, of most of the 2009 ramen preview magazines that came out in January. Getting there very early has its advantages - we got there just before 7 PM, and waited only about 15 mins, then took about 20 mins to eat. However when we walked out there was a very long line, about 15-20 people. I ordered the chashu tsukemen, with some slices of chashu and some small bits in the bowl. The broth from ramen zero appears to be a chicken/pork mixture, with menmas and small bits of pork mixed into the broth. The wait staff really rushed people in and out, also it was very brightly lit inside, not a lot of ambiance overall, So I think this place is a bit over-hyped and not the type of experience that I was hoping for from this place from the Setagaya ramen chain (the Setagaya ramen location and some of its sister locations in Setagaya-ku). The service was very quick, as I mentioned they will they will take your order before you sit down. Here is a picture of the ticket machine. Suprisingly, given the chicken flavor, the similar noodles, and the little bits of meat in the broth, overall I got a strong taste "flash-back" to Campbells' Chicken Noodle soup, which I probably had not had in 5 years.

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Sujita/Hirakawachoすじ田/平河町

  

Sujita is a chain of 3 shops in Tokyo (also in Iidabashi and Ochanomizu). Line of about 10 people outside. They make a very good tonkotsu gyokai (yes another one, seems like they are all the rage for a year or two now). Their gimmick is a special green yuzu-like fruit called a sudachi. Their special instructions say to mix the sudachi and the shichimi together (actually on top of the noodles, not the broth, according to the staff, they corrected me). There's a very limited menu on the ticket machine, not large at all, and they have no way of ordering chashu topping, just menma and nori. The portion was decent and the wait staff was extremely friendly, asking me where I was from and showing me the correct way to mix the ingredients together. My only recommendation (other than a bigger store), would be a a bit more chashu in the bowl. A picture of the proper mixing procedure is above.

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Genbu/Shimokitazawa玄武/下北沢

Billed as a gyoza senmonten (expert shop), the sui gyoza were better than the yaki gyoza. The place was decent but very smoky, there's no separate smoking place. The service was exceedingly slow. Cheap lunch sets though. The shoyu ramen had very thin slices of pork in it. Very good chashu don on rice. This is a chain of several shops. You can order from the regular menu at lunch time. Interesting place for an interesting little town of Shimokitazawa.

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Watanabe/Takadanobaba渡なべ/高田馬場

 

Yes, yet another tonkotsu gyokai place. However this is considered one of the "anchor stores" of the Takadanobaba area around Waseda. It was quite dark inside, only 8-9 seats, no tables. The the door is broken, they have to fix that, very hard to open and close, be careful not to slam it. Not flashy at all from the outside, honestly you would almost walk right by the place and miss it. So Juan Watanabe is a "ramen consultant" and was recently mentioned in various 2009 "review" magazines about ramen. He also has another venture, the Motoi ramen shop in Machida City. This shop "Watanabe" is quite famous and has a very high ranking on Supleks, this is probably considered one of the "anchor" shops. I had the chashu tsukemen, with standard standard plain noodles. The pork was very fatty, with strips of clear fat running down the slices. The menma here were an interesting difference - they were huge, 3-4 inches long, 1/4 inch thick and very crunchy. The noodle amount was small for the price IMO though, and there was a large amount of thinly sliced negis on top. Other reviews list this as a "date" restaurant, I can't argue with that since I went during the day, not at night, but there were only 1 or 2 couples in there when I went.

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Waseda Ramen review (English)
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KuroTora/Akihabara黒虎/秋葉原

 

I'll say that this place is in Akihabara even though it is technically Kandaizumicho. I was the first one in there on a Saturday, just after the open. It is right on Showa Dori - up about 1 min or so walking north (on the east side) from the light across Showa Dori, right behind Yodobashi Akiba. It was rather dark inside, there is no ticket machine or even printed menus, the only menu they had was a hand-written one, one that they take down from the wall and show you - my recommendation from that menu is the "aburi kaku ni raumen" (炙り角煮らうめん). It was a good tonkotsu gyoukai - a standard offering, not a lot of grittiness. Very unique to this place was two large pieces of kakuni buta, at least 3/4 of an inch thick and three inches long, not unlike Musashi in Okachimachi right near by. The only complaint is that for the price 950 or 1000 yen IIRC, there should have been more noodles. Actually it is a fairly large place, but counter only, and quite roomy inside. Pressed garlic and shichimi were available on the counter. The soup had chopped tama-negis and green onions and the black stringy mushroom thingys. Overall this was pretty good - again roughly the same style as the Kaku Ni ramen at the Okachimachi Musashiya.

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Dragon Hanten/Ebisuドラゴン飯店/恵比寿

 

Until about 3 months ago I was actually not aware that this place was here - we don't always come down this far from the office at lunch time. It's owned by the Kiwa Group, a conglomerate that owns a number of Chinese restaurant chains in the city and elsewhere. It's next to a branch of Toraji that I have been to and which is quite good. However this place is not on Supleks (at least the current name of the place is not, the old one is there though) It's more of a Chinese cuisine place I think, although they do have several noodle dishes including various ramens. The name of the place when I went to it was Dragon Hanten. Inside it's more like a Chinese cafe, located on two floors, with larger rooms on the second floor. It's supposed to be quite famous for the dan-dan men - however I had the suratanmen, which was pretty good, however it was served really hot and the noodles were very fine, which is a problem since they tend to get mushy quickly when the broth is very hot. And the service was *really* slow (for 1 PM on a Saturday even), maybe one of the waitstaff was out or something. It's right across from the "two sisters" Korean barbecue place with the yellow sign. The service was so slow that the people at the next table were getting annoyed with the slow service, something you rarely see in Japan.

UPDATE 2009-02-16 - they appear to have upgraded the service level and the server was very quick and friendly, and I had a great meal with my coworkers, including various Szechuan style dishes.

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Ramen Daijiro/Akihabaraらーめん 大二郎/秋葉原

 

On the street in Akihabara that runs parallel to Chuo Dori but more west, a new Jiro-like place opened up in late 2008, the only one of that type in the area I believe. However of course the Kanda Jiro is about 10-15 mins walk to the west. Technically this area is Suehirocho or SotoKanda but I will list it under Akihabara since that's what many visitors will be looking for. This is the first Jiro-like ramen place in the immediate area that I know of. When you go there, it's very important to remember that the owners do not want people waiting inside the store - don't enter until someone leaves. While waiting outside, if you are tall, please don't bang your head on the lantern. They have one table for 4, and a total of 12 counter seats (3 and 9), and a toilet in the back. I always wondered why there weren't more Jiros or Jiro-like ramen places in the upper right hand corner of the loop, and more specifically why there wasn't one in Akihabara - you would figure this would be the perfect place for one based on the type of people who like Jiro and hang out in Akihabara. The former name of this place was "winter horse" I believe. The noodles were spaghetti thickness and while they were the right Jiro color, they didn't have as much bite or taste as the thicker ones found at many Jiros. The soup was mostly shoyu, with only some tonkotsu - there were fat chunks but the broth was still relatively clear for a Jiro-like broth, whereas in some places the broth becomes a brownish gravy (at least before the fat rises to the top). The veggies were about 50/50 moyashi and cabbetsu and the cabbetsu was cut into very big pieces - however the pork was one area were it was significantly different from Jiro locations - most Jiros branches use a loin type of cut - tenderloin or eye, which come with some fat - but these were belly cuts, like kaku ni-style - don't get me wrong, it was good, it was just not a true "Jiro" style rough pork cut in that sense. Each piece was more than 1/2 fat, which would be a problem even at a real Jiro. There were 4 people working there - the most I have ever seen in a place like this, I think - very orderly, getting bowls to people quite quickly after they sat down. Tissues and spoons. Recommended for the taste and the novelty in Akiba.

Amasan review
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Shinka/Kamataしんか/鎌田

 

Shinka probably has the best ramen broth I have ever had - not counting Jiro. An extremely good balance of salt, fat, pork flavor, texture, richness. The garlic spoon was kind of chintsy but that's a minor point. The writing on the outside of store and the sign is rather hard to read. The noodles were average (but home made) and the pork was decent too - decent thickness but not grilled - good portion too. The broth had lots of chopped onions. It was 2 PM on a half/day Monday when I went and I got to walk through the slightly seedy part of Kamata, with coin lockers right next to hostess bars and love hotels. Kamata, which you can get to on either the JR Keihin Tohoku sen or the Tokyu Ikegami sen, is one of those ramen "paradises" (many shops relatively close together) that is not-so-well-known to outsiders and tourists who concentrate mostly on places like Shinjuku, Ebisu and Takadanobaba. Kamata has a few stars within reasonable walking distance of the station - as for Supleks they have 4 60+ places and 6 50+ places including Zoot, this place and a branch of Ramen Dai.

Tokyo Walker review
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Gyoranzaka/Taito魚らん坂/台東

 

Very few places were open on this end of year holiday. This place was basically average but was doing a brisk business due to this. The negi chashu ramen was decent, with a Tokyo tonkotsu shoyu broth that was actually a bit weak - they also had shio and tsukemen broth. It's right outside Exit 1 of the Naka-Okachimachi Hibiya line station. They rate 27 on Supleks. There are much better options within < 5 mins walk from here. Very cramped - there wrere people waiting right behind me as I was eating. Only two tables for 4.

Livedoor review
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Ganso Sapporo-ya/Hiroo元祖札幌や/広尾

 

This Sapporo-ya is a small place with counter and 5-6 tables and isn't much to look at from either the inside or the outside but the food is better than the decor suggests. They actually have a large menu, somewhat more of a Chinese place with various chahans and ramens, including miso and kimchi. The Hiroo area, as a major gaijin enclave in Tokyo, has very few ramen shops and none that are really note worthy after Kazuki and Marutomi. There was very friendly quick service, a couple of other gaijins in the place - they have an English menu (with significantly fewer items on it of course), but don't appear to speak any English. They have a special tsukemen claiming to look and taste like a tonkotsu gyoukai, and it was decent but not really special, just a shoyu with some fish taste in it. They have decent pork and a generous amount. The noodles were garden variety. Not much atmosphere but very quick service. If you are in the Hiroo neighborhood and need some noodles and pork and broth, this will suffice.

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Poppoya/Yushimaぽっぽや/湯島

  

This is the second Poppoya that I have been to - the first one being in Nihonbashi. The portion at this branch was much bigger than the other Poppoya. This branch also has a special abura soba that looked similar to Ikaruga's.... but only a fixed number of them per day. This is probably the smallest ramen shop I have been in a in a while - only 8 seats in an awkward 4x4 configuration. It's right across from Daiki, and you can see the length of the Daiki line in the above picture. There were about 5 people outside, including older and younger couples. If you get the tsukemen you will be asked warm or cold noodles. They have that free Ramen Bank magazine there now, the one that is like the Torasan one but free. This place is closed on Sundays but open on holidays (but check first). The things that distinguish Poppoya from Jiro, even though the pictures look similar, are the garlickyness and onionyness of the broth and the more rounded shape and significantly harder firmness of the noodles. As I said they were much more generous on the portion and the extra chashu. Very quick service. The branch in Nihonbashi is ranked the best as of this writing, but this one is a close second. Always good as a backup if the line at Daiki is too long , which it always seems to be. I always walk out of any Poppoya with the same satisfied feeling (at least taste-wise).

TabeAruki review (much better pictures)
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Ramen Jiro/Keisei Okuboラーメン二郎/京成大久保

 

Another Jiro crossed off the list. Now two left, in Omiya and Tochigi-ken. This one took a while to get to - you have to take the JR Sobu line to Funabashi station, then switch to the local train to get to Keisei Okubo station, then you walk north/northwest about 15 minutes. There was a line of about 3 people outside and 9 waiting inside. It's a very clean and new store, recently moved from another location (down the street I believe). The (presumably) husband and wife team were working behind the counter - he was pretty intense, the wife was more laid back and he glowered at her when she got in the way. There were no tissues there. They have a decent-sized bowl - they also have a mini Jiro too as well as tsukemen also. Unfortunately they have very dry chashu though. The noodles were linguine-size and there was a very standard and normal jiro taste. There's a drink vending machine right outside and a bus stop right across the street. If you live in the area, then this is your Jiro, but it's hard to list it as a Recommended, since is it not in Tokyo and is so far.

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Rasuta/Yoyogiらすた/代々木

 

On the main drag going west from JR Yoyogi Station, there was a line of about 5 people on a cool Feburary Saturday. This was prior to a Costco trip with a couple of my friends from work. They offer an interesting, slightly spicy tsukemen with a large generous portion of pork, but a bit too much sesame and nori. The broth was a bit watery, with chopped green and white onions floating in it. Most people were getting the regular ramen as it was cold that day. The water dispenser is in an awkward location so get your water first, or bring tea from outside. The ticket machine is outside next to the door. This place is not so hightly ranked on livedoor, just an average score. On the plus side it is a very bright and well-lit store with fixed stools on the floor and while tile walls. The noodles were like very thick linguine with small bits of togarashi in it. There were garlic, sesame and koshou on the table. The instructions on the back wall tell you how to mix them all thogether in the proper way. This place is decent but you can do better around Yoyogi station.

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Aika/Hachioji City藍華/八王子市

 

Aika offers a very hearty tsukemen, with probably the thickest and strongest-taste broth I have had in a long while, if ever. The shop is interesting and "cozy", with two guys and a lot of steamy pots boiling. The steam condensed and droplets ran down the big glass picture windows in the cold winter weather. They have 7 chairs and one small table for two. They have both lunch and evening menus - they are both pasted on the window outside so make sure that you are looking at the correct one. There's no ticket machine. You get a tsukemen bowl full of onions and pork, and a broth that is almost like a stew - the onions are interesting since are a combination of both the chopped tama negis and the stringy type. The noodles were well-cooked, slightly thick, and had nori on top of them. Now this place is about 15-20 mins walk from JR Hachioji station, and while you walk through the shopping district (the diagonal street that runs northwest from the station), you can see a number of good ramen places. They have a ranking of 66 on Supleks - very popular and well-regarded - but there was no line (although the shop was full). If you want a full meal you might want to get the omori size though, the default noodle amount was only 200 grams.

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Ramen Jiro/Yokohama Kannaiラーメン二郎/横浜関内

 

Be sure to remember that this Jiro is closed on Wednesdays. It's right on the main drag going west from JR Kannai station on the Keihin Tohoku sen. There was a line of about 15 people at 1 PM in the afternoon on a Thursday - this was expected for a Jiro and a shop of this level of food quality. Make sure that when you get close to the door you are not blocking the sidewalk since people come down that sidewalk on bikes really fast. Get a drink from the machine outside before hand. This is a really "sparsely-appointed Jiro", to put it mildly, and it is very narrow in the back, with a bunch of curtains hiding a bunch of boxes. This is quite definitely the best shiru-nashi abura soba I have had anywhere, maybe with the exception of Ikaruga. There's an interesting picture above of the fish that were hanging out to dry in front of the place - probably must be for the restuaurant/izakaya next door. You can get the shiru nashi without the raw egg. While the chashu is the rolled type, it is not the stringy thin-cut rolled type, bur rather a thicker type that falls apart nicely in the bowl and is not too fatty. This is the only Ramen Jiro in Yokohama, but not the only one in Kanagawa-ken. A very rich broth, the noodles were done perfectly - unfortunately I screwed up and forgot to take a picture of it, so I will have to cheat and point you to someone else's on the Internet. This is definitely a recommended shop. you can take the express Keihin Tohoku sen from JR Shinagawa or Tokyo stations, from Shinagawa it will get to Kannai in about 25 mins, and then it's about 10 mins brisk walk going west from the station.

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Totoken/Yokohama Kannai唐桃軒/横浜関内

 

Very good pork in this place. Large thick slices with good fat-to-meat ratio. All hand made, and you can buy the pork in slabs to take home - but it is rather expensive. http://homepage2.nifty.com/totoken/hanbai.html can also be used to order it on line. The broth and noodles were just decent though - standard plain shoyu broth, a little skimpy on the noodle portion. Looks like not much of a store from the outside but has a decent rating on supleks for such a small place. Various types of people came in while I was there - this is a local place right next to the station stairwell that has been there for a long time and has some history. Very quick service - I had a bowl 2 minutes after I walked in...

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Higashi Kanda Ramen/NishiOshima東神田らーめん/西大島

 

This is a very small place with only one person working the store on a Saturday, only 8 or 9 stools at a single counter, and no tables. As it was cold that day everyone else waiting on line was standing inside the place - the layout and character of the inside of the store reminded me of Benten. The TV in the corner blaring out some documentary and a number of ramen magazines and reviews of the shop are on the bookshelves near the door. Interesting mix of people - construction workers, a set of 4 people (two middle-aged couples) and two fairly elderly ladies all slurping at the counter. A fairly decent score of 47 on Supleks (the shop's home page link on the supleks page appears to be dead). In any case I had the chashu tsukemen - a very rich dark broth, somewhat thick, with medium thickness noodles. Quite salty. Chashu was about matchbook thickness but had been grilled well - no complaints there. This place is a little bit out of the way in NishiOjima (take the Toei Shinjuku-sen). The single guy was really hustling behind the counter. A special limited-time limited-number of spicy korean tsukemens were available each day at the time I went. Check the signs next to the ticket machine to see if there is some other special.

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Ichibanya/Jiyugaokaいちばんや/自由が丘

   

Accompanying my wife to Jiyugaoka one sunny winter day, I stopped into Ichibanya to have their special "maguro" ramen - the maguro slices weres flavored with coarse black pepper. Standard shoyu broth, a bit watery if anything. The maguro was very thin, almost matchbook sized pieces, the pork was even thinner - they were paper thin, with the fat they were practically translucent. Overall the ramen was a - when I declined the boiled egg, they got some points for offering me menmas in place of the nuki tamago, not many places do this. After I walked in, other people started filing in, right at 11:30 on the dot. This place is in the basement down a fairly steep stair case - there are also pictures outside of all of the items on the menu. There are 12 seats in "L" configuration and an easy to read menu on the machine. The beef and fish-based medium brownness broth also had a medium level of richness with no fat but as I said it tasted a bit thin. The noodles were also extremely thin too. It was a bit expensive for what you get but hey this is Jiyugaoka. It's also right next to/under an interesting gyoza place with good take-out and eat in gyoza (takeout are yakigyoza only). They also have cabbage, spicy beef miso moyashi and kyuri with miso sauce, all just like Gyoza Lou in Harajuku. There was practically nobody in the place, but the single man behind the counter (of the gyoza place) was still rushing around like a madman.

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GSTA-MEN/Kanda Surugadaiグスタメン/神田駿河台

UPDATE 2009-02-01: This place is now called DON Go-ju-ban, it appears as though the author of the amasan blog went there yesterday, but it's not clear whether it is still open or closed, since supleks has it as closed: http://amasan.livedoor.biz/archives/51393876.html#trackback



If you are fan of the rich and spicy "dan dan men" (坦々麺) then this is one ramen shop you can't miss in Tokyo. If you don't know what dan dan men is then please refer to the Ramen Glossary on the left. This shop is done out in this interesting LA gangster rapper motif, all the way from the murals on the inside walls of the shop to the bullet-shaped GSTA-MEN logo outside above the front door. There were only a couple of other people in there when I went, I imagine this type of ramen goes down much better in winter than in summer - I can't believe I went to this place in the middle of August. The dan dan men was quite hot/spicy, it was hard to finish the whole bowl. It has a tonkatsu-looking really really deep fried giant thing in the middle of it that I'm pretty sure was pork. One nice touch was that afterwards the ojisan (a young guy) offered me a glass of a syrupy lemon drink, sort of like an intermezzo, and it really helped get the hot taste out of my mouth. With one exception, dan dan men is the only type of ramen that they have on the menu, so make sure that's what you like. It's in the middle of an area that has lots of skiing and snowboard shops. Overall this is different enough and well-done enough to earn a Recommended, just make sure you can handle something like this before you go.

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