Tsukemen Nakamura/Shinsenつけ麺 なかむら/神泉

  

Not a lot to see here - was drawn to this place due to the thick noodles in the Saito link below, which are no longer available. Based on the size of the place, the big open doors, the length of the counter, the location (really more Dogenzaka), and the fact that the machine has a wide range of selections of broths, the hours etc. I would say this is a "after clubbing in Shibuya place", that wants to pack in lots of half-drunk fully-starved people and as such has to appeal to a wide range of tastes. Places like that then tend to do everything decently but nothing especially well, and this appears to be no exception. The one thing I will say is that the noodles were really chewy. The shoyu tsukemen broth was "cloyingly sweet" as they say. Barely worth the climb up the hill from the main drag.

Saito Blog
Google Maps

Kiraboshi/Musashino Cityきら星/武蔵野市

    

I really wanted to give Kiraboshi a "Recommended", but something is just missing for me here, and it doesn't justify the lines I've seen in pictures. The place is extremely cramped, the waitresses were slightly falling over each other, one of them actually dropped a rice bowl into a customer's lap while I was standing in line. The water machine takes almost 30 seconds to dispense a cup of room-temperature water with no ice. The tsukemen is standard tonkotsu gyoukai, but they put an amount of cabbage on top and then coat it a bit more with a special brown fish-based sauce, either saba (mackerel) or katsuo (bonito)-based. The line was about 10 people when I got there. Most shops of this high ranking on Supleks (68) will also have a high ranking on other sites such as Tabelog, this one does not (3.14), as of this writing. They also offer a special "yamitsuki" (addictive) "change Jiro" topping for 100 yen that presumably makes it taste more like Jiro. The spice tubes there in the picture looked like they had been sittng there for ages.

Saito Blog
Zatsu Blog with better pictures than mine
Google Maps

Kaeru/NakanoKaeru/中野

 

Good Poppoya clone - the tennushi is a veteran of Poppoya in Yushima. The place is in an area of Nakano near Nakano Broadway known as ふれあいロード or Fureai Road. Probably 5-10 other ramen shops within 3 mins walking distance from here including a branch of Aoba. All sorts of other interesting shops around here too, this place is probably worth a couple hours of exploring time. Very simple menu - ramen, tsukemen or abura men. Very oniony and garlicky and salty broth. Various free toppings as you can see on the pictures on the link below. Not clear here whether Kaeru means "come back/go back" or "frog" as there are no kanji that I can see.

Saito Blog
Google Maps

Hazuki/YukigayaOtsuka葉月/雪谷大塚

 

Long line, about 10 people. Cramped inside. Excellent gyoukai tonkotsu, ask for the special gentei noukou (very thick, but limited number each day) thick one with extremely thick noodles also, rich broth and some of the thickest menma I have ever seen. Decent pork. No ticket machine, pay the woman when you leave. She seems very rushed but still seems to maintain some politeness. Large portion. If you don't want the noukou tsukemen then they put the menu out front on a stand for people to look at while they are waiting. Closed Mondays and Tuesdays, except when they are holidays.

I also just noticed in looking back on this post that this was my 100th Recommended shop, after approximately 300 that I've been to in total. Happy Thanksgiving.

Ramen 26 Blog
Google Maps

Rahmen Academy/MusashiurawaRahmen Academy/武蔵浦和

     

The Saitama-ken Musashiurawa Rahmen Academy is open from 11 to midnight every day of the week except Sunday, when they are only open until 10 PM. Some shops may be open shorter or longer times than that. It's located right near JR Musashiurawa Station and it is another one of these ramen theme parks that you see dotted all around Tokyo, typically in shopping malls near stations. This place has 5 or 6 shops, all seemingly good, but none of them appeared to be particularly well-known or outstanding. There was one Yokohama-style place, one Hokkaido, one Hakata, one Chinese place and one of unknown lineage. I ate at the Hokkaido-style one, called Marutake, which appears to be affiliated with the Mutsumiya chain. I had the current special, the sesame miso ramen with cabbage and pork - this was a very strongly-sesame-flavored dish, with plenty of cabbage but a bit skimpy on the pork, which they browned with one of those gas torches immediately before bringing it over. The noodles appeared to be hand-made but not sure, they were thin and not curly. Good dish but the flavor was very strong. This place is actually huge, a long, long counter with a deep kitchen behind it, obviously built to handle a lot of customers. But not too many people in the place on a Sunday PM, I sure hope for their sake that they get a lot of people during the week. You can see some of the other specialty dishes from some of the other stores in the picture above. One other interesting thing on the menu at Marutake was the yaki-shorompo - haven't seen the yaki version of those before, those I did not try. However if you are in the mood for Chinese food the Chinese place Wang Rong right next door looks like a better bet actually. Good but not worth a special trip to Saitama.

Rahmen Academy - Home Page
Rahmen Academy - Pictures of How To Get There
Google Maps

Buta Ko Mugi/Gotanda豚とこむぎ/五反田

 

Another Jiro clone (name means "pig and barley/wheat"), this time near JR Gotanda station. Very friendly woman with powerful lungs outside guiding people into the shop. The background music was the Beatles. Broth was a bit weak, not like a real Jiro taste, soup was almost clear, not too much fat. Had a nice conversation with one of the other patrons sitting next to me (who spoke pretty good English) about the local area and our work. Pork was fairly dry. Noodles very thin, like linguine. Shoyu tare in the tall brown beer bottle with the dispenser top. Free toppings include tama negi, a bit rare for this type of shop. They also had a gentei curry-topped ramen that actually looked a bit strange in the photo on the wall. The Gotanda area can use a Jiro-themed shop, but we can probably do better than this, especially this close to the one on Yamate Dori. First 10 customers on line every day get free extra pork. Closed on Sundays. Don't rush.

On the way back stopped at the Wired Cafe on the second floor of the Gotanda Atre, above the Seijo Ishii. Internet signal iffy as always there.

Supleks page
Google Maps

Tokyo Tori Soba Tomo/Higashi OiTOKYO 鶏そば TOMO/東大井

 

A new (or at least uncommon) idea in ramen - chicken soup, and a pretty good one too. Better than Ramen Zero, in my opinion. This ramen shop Tokyo Tori Soba Tomo specializes in only one kind of broth - chicken. Note that I said chicken, not shio. While shio broth usually comes from chicken stock as a base, this broth is really what I would call "home-style" chicken soup. I believe there might be a bit of tonkotsu in there too, but not sure, as I detected a faint taste of it, and it was super salty and fatty, even fattier than could be expected from just chicken. I got the tori chashu men (鶏チャーシューメン) which comes with five or six slices of chicken breast "chashu", all with the skin on. The chicken that these slices came from must have been well-grilled, and interestingly enough there were also little extra slices of grilled chicken skin in the bowl too, you can see them in the lower left of the bowl. Very small shop, only 8-9 seats, simple menu on the machine. The tori chashu men doesn't come with an egg by default. Definitely better than its rank on Supleks suggests, worth a trip if you are in the area, say for the Ito Yokado or similar.

Supleks page
Men Koi blog (good pics)
Google Maps

Mutekiya/Ikebukero無敵家/南池袋

   

Mutekiya (literally "no-enemies shop" or "shop without rivals") is located in Ikebukero on Meiji Dori south of the east entrance(s) to JR Ikebukero Station, and further south of some of the Seibu stores and Muji. It had fairly long lines for a Friday afternoon - tourists might have an advantage here since if they come during the week they will avoid the unbelievably long lines that are supposed to be present on the weekends. Also watch all of the bicycles that zoom down Meiji-dori, both on the street and on the sidewalks. There are no seats (for waiting) inside, you will be motioned to come in by the staff when seats are available, either at the counter or one of the small tables. Watch the first step when you go in, it's right next to the register and someone managed to trip over it when I was there. Note the interesting woks hanging outside, painted with the store's name in kanji. I had the chashu-men, which is not on the English web site but was on the Japanese menu that the staff had when they came out to take my orders ahead of time - be ready with what you want to order ahead of time - you could print out the English menu from the link below and circle what you want and bring it with you. The chashu was of medium thickness and well cooked - the soup was a really really creamy tonkotsu that must have been strained multiple times. The noodles were just plain. All in all it was good but not sure it's was worth waiting on line 40 mins for.

Shop home page (note the helpful "Foreign Langurage" link in upper right)
Google Maps

Tokyo Ramen Street/Rokurinsha Omiyage Unboxing東京ラーメンストリート/六厘舎 お土産

    

In JR Tokyo Station there is a special (and long) hallway with numerous shops and restaurants called the "Tokyo Eki Ichi Ban Gai". This is one of several shopping areas under Tokyo Station. One special section of this hall was upgraded and refurbished and a group of 4 ramen shops were opened there in June. These shops were already famous in Tokyo, and these new locations are just branches, not their main shops. The 4 shops are Rokurinsha, Hirugao, Keisuke and Mutsumiya, some of which have been reviewed on this site already.

Tokyo Station is one of the main points for the shinkansen to stop in Tokyo. Many people who visit Tokyo want to do some shopping and also eat in some "authentic" Tokyo restaurants such as ramen shops, that they would not normally have had time to wait on line for (at the honten) during their trip. So Rokurinsha was for a long time, and probably still is, in the top 10 of ramen shops in Japan. It's well known and it's not suprising how long the lines are to get in and get a bowl.

No waiting on line for me today - I've only waited on line for Rokurinsha once, at the original store, for more than an hour. So I bought the omiyage that is available at this store and it was, in short, excellent. It really has the real Rokurinsha tonkotsu gyoukai taste and the best part of it is, you don't have to wait on the long line that you see in the pictures above. There is no comparison between this stuff and the ramen packages available in the supermarkets - even if they are from "destination" shops such as Hirugao, which I know Mitsukoshi sells for example. The Rokurinsha line actually extends to the other side of the hall. (The red rope on the right side holds back the line of people waiting on the other side.) Simply go to the right of the "guy with arms folded" sign and there is a window where you can buy the omiyage without having to wait. Better pictures here. You will be asked whether you want the 1 person box (850 yen) or the 3 person (2550 yen), the unboxing above is the 1 person. As some of the items in the box will be frozen, you will also be given dry ice. I recommend eating this stuff the same day if you can. This omiyage must have been taken directly from the pot and put into the bags and the box, it really had that same fresh taste.

That evening I did the unboxing. Included are a large white package of soup and pork, a package of noodles, one sheet of nori and some ground pork powder. The instructions, which are included but are in Japanese, basically say to put the pouch in water for 15 mins (I don't think it needed that long), cook the noodles separately, then pour the pouch into one bowl and the noodles in another. Be sure to rinse the noodles thoroughly in cool water (grab them with your hands as you rinse them, you will see how much stuff sticks to them) and enjoy. Excellent taste and no waiting. If you absolutely must say that you ate at Rokurinsha then by all means feel free to wait on line - but if you just want the taste then this is the product for you. No long lines like at the Hibiya Tsukemen Fair either.

Tokyo Ichi Ban gai Ramen Street home page
Tokyo Ichi Ban gai Ramen Street map
Google Map