Sichuan Dou Hua/Marunouchi四川豆花飯荘/丸の内

 

High end Szechwan cuisine and prices to match, at least at dinner, in good old (new?) Shin Marubiru. The service lunch is 1500 yen, I chose the large bowl of suratanmen but they also have mapo tofu etc. which is good. The 8-treasure tea is interesting with the guy in the yellow Chinese jumpsuit running around and the long spout pitcher but I could have taken it or left it. The guy does this crazy pouring thing with a long pot. Free refills since he just adds more hot water to the cup. In any case somewhat tomatoe-y taste, with large chunks of tomato. My favorite suratanmen places have large chunks of tofu, egg and pork in the broth, this wasn't that. A nice effort but not worth the trip just for lunch - I have yet to try it for dinner, I have higher expectations there but it will be pricy.

If you want good quality Szechuan food (including my favorite gong bao ji ding or "kung pao chicken", which is hard to find at Chinese restaurants in Tokyo) at about 1/3 the price: 知音食堂

Google Maps
Livedoor Gourmet Page
English Link, slightly broken

Bigakuya/Kiba美学屋/木場

   

Very tasty shio ramen in Kiba, near the Gatharia Lotus Park that has a branch of Iron Chef Chen Kenichi's Mabo Tofu shop (陳建一 麻婆豆腐店). Perfectly salty broth made from various types of chicken including Oyama, and good firm noodles, both thinner and medium thickness are offered for the ramen. Regular amount 200 yen. You will receive the thinner one by default. Very-well ranked on Supleks. Closed Sundays (for dinner) and holidays.

Google Maps
Supleks Database Page

Shinatetsu/Nakanobuしなてつ/荏原町

 

At Shinatetsu in Nakanobu (Tokyu Oimachi Line, Ebaramachi Station), not to be confused with Shinatatsu in Shinagawa, what looks like a husband and wife team work together to create good quality shoyu-blend ramen. They opened in March of 2010. There is no ticket machine so you order at the counter. It was a bit hot inside and narrow, so push your seat all the way in. They have a special dan-dan men this month that I did not try. Crowded at lunch time but no line. Their chashu pork consisted of good juicy cuts that were well-grilled, in a nice clear broth. However the amount of noodles coud have been bigger. The wonton chashu men is also worth a try. It's next to a small but interesting shoten gai. Good but not spectacular. Closed Mondays.

Restaurant Columbo is also highly recommended in Ebaramachi, but you typically need to call ahead for a table.

Google Maps
Tabelog Page

Menya Shimiru/Meguro麺屋しみる/目黒

     

Menya Shimiru just opened recently under the Rasoi and Meguro Tavern locations on Meguro-Dori going southwest from JR Meguro Station. (If it's the one I am thinking of, then shimiru しみる means "to penetrate"). Shimiru is in the basement of the building, and there are actually two ways to get in. It offers a very thin, quite dark and slightly sweet gyokai broth, more shoyu than fishy, with a powdery texture. There is no pork in the broth, only in the tsukemen bowl. All items were served on a nice lacquer tray. The tsukemen noodles were slightly-less-than-medium-thickness and good hand-made ones - the ramen ones are slightly thinner then those. I got there around 11:30 AM on a Sat and I was the first one there. They have a high counter so I was unable to see most of what was going on in the kitchen. Posters on the counter expound on the marvelous power of katsuobushi. Ask for tissues if there aren't any under the counter as the sign says they should be there. I am researching the first kanji character on the noren (the one in front of "hara" and will update this post when I know what it is. They have a number of sake bottles placed around the room and hanging from the ceiling but it is not clear or not whether the place is also an izakaya at night - they close at 9 PM so that suggests "not". No vacation day.

Their Home Page, Sort Of
Google Maps
Tabelog Page

Koushi/Komaba嚆矢/駒場

  

Koushi is located along the main drag in Komaba going south from Keio Komabatodaimae station towards the Tsukuba Daigaku/Komaba High School campus. It was crowded as soon as I walked in - not many other places nearby for one, but for a place in this type of suburb to be this crowded immediately after open is a very good sign. Very good ranking of 52+ on Supleks. No ticket machine, you order verbally. Only one guy working on a Saturday, presumably the tennushi, and he was working really hard. He will ask you to sit apart if there are two of you but no two seats together. There are also 4 waiting seats inside, some near the door and some further back. I had the very different torisoba (とりそば, 8th down on the left-hand side of the menu picture above) standard but good shoyu broth, thin egg noodles, and I got the omori for big volume. A good volume of well-grilled/fried chicken was placed on top - but the skin is left on. He said to another customer that sometimes on Saturdays he opens a little late occasionally. He also hand-makes his wontons right there in front of you. Busy on the weekends but closed on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Google Maps
Supleks Page

Shimento/Ogikubo四面燈/荻窪

    

This is a Jiro clone in Ogikubo, the best one in a long time. Well-blended between shoyu and tonkotsu, very salty broth, one of the best broths out of all the the Jiro clones that I have had. Well-cut pork pieces, good balance of dark meat and lighter meat and fat as you can see from the pictures. Nice really thick squiggly chigire hand-made noodles, like super-thick linguine. You want the second button from the left on the machine, on the top row, 850 yen. No wait on a Saturday immediately after open. Regulars coming in immediately, good sign. Check the opening times, and days before you go. Interesting comic at each seat that explains some of the menu items and provides some light comedy. Watch for bicycles up and down the street when you exit. At the ticket hand-over time that's when you tell them what toppings you want. The sign outside says "doka-mori". The best translation I can find for doka is heavy, earthen, bulky, noisy. This is a bulky hearty bowl that will certainly satisfy.

Google Maps
Good Pictures

Mega Ganja/Kawagoe Cityメガガンジャ/川越市

  

Good Ramen Jiro-inspired shop, admittedly out of the way in Kawagoe City in Saitama, but fortunately right near the station. Long shotengai to walk down near it, with stores like Zara, Starbucks and Maruhiro. Square-in-cross section extremely thick (as thick as the chopsticks) darker Jiro-style noodles. Soup is decent but average for this type of shop. Very strict shop staff, made us wait outside even in the rainy cold. Buy your ticket and then queue up outside close to the building. They also add (for 150 yen more) a special aburi (アブリ) grilled fatty pork bits on the side. Huge volume for the price if you get the extra veggies ("yasai mashi") Closed Wednesdays.

Google Maps
Shop Home Page
Other Blog

Ume no Ya/Takeoka梅の屋/竹岡

    

Took a day trip to do some hiking along the Uchibo Line and the southern end of Chiba. Got off at JR Takeoka Station - cats and spiders all over the place. This is the famed source for Takeoka ramen - Umenoya. The pork is cut from a long fatty grilled block. The noodles are actually dry cup ramen or dry block ramen noodles - "kanmen", taken from dry ramen packs, could not see the name. It's a very informal shop with shared tables and a small zashiki area. It takes a long while (for me about 30 mins) to get the ramen, even though you preorder and there are 5 obachan's working the place, only about 20 seats. It's a very dark shoyu type broth - Takeoka-style with a lot of chopped onions, much darker and richer than ordinary shoyu, almost starting to get brownish-red. I strongly recommend the chopped negi's. The little street that you wait on is very narrow and even on a weekday, you should expect a line. There's a very small menu on the window near the door. After eating you can have a nice walk north along the coast from Takeoka, continuing up to Kazusaminato Station. Hard to say whether it's worth it for people who live in Tokyo - this is the greater part of a day trip, perhaps combine it with something else.

Google Maps
Good Pictures of the Interior

Suzu/Ebisuすず/恵比寿

  
 

Suzu ("bell", すず, 鈴) is located in Ebisu, off Komazawa Dori, around the corner from the KFC, across from the station. It's near the little tiny shrine where the managers from the Sapporo headquarters at Ebisu Garden Place come to pray every year for good business the following year. They have a very limited menu on the ticket machine, from which specifically I had the shiro-dashi, the white button in the upper left (see pics below). The counter is low and the kitchen is small - this place is an excellent way to see the entire behind-the-counter basic operation of a ramen shop. The soup is made from an Aomori-ken "shamo" - a special type of game fowl. The noodles were good but the rest of the dish was nothing special, for the price. It also includes fish, scallops etc. The pork comes from Aomori-ken. Decent.

Google Maps
Better Pics Than Mine

Reset Water from Hideyuki Ishigami石神秀幸からリセットウォーター

Ramen superstar Hideyuki Ishigami (石神秀幸) has come out with his own line of custom water. This water is called Reset Water and is ostensibly intended to "reset" your body after eating a large fatty meal (hmm can we think of anything like that). Each bottle contains 140 mg of magnesium. Feel free to look up magnesium and fat and decide for yourself whether this water will do anything for you. As for the taste I can say that it tastes like someone dissolved a stick of blackboard chalk in the bottle.

New Ramen Jiro in Nakayama Opens This Weekend

The 36th Ramen Jiro opens in Nakayama (JR Yokohama Line or Green Line) this weekend, Dec 12.

Here's the address plus some initial pics.

Full report to come in due course.

Learning to Manage Your Own Ramen Jiro

Sorry for the lack of posts recently - another multi-week trip to China. But was able to write up a bunch of reviews for past visits on the flights, and will be posting them shortly.

Until then, a short announcement that there is an interesting book just out titled:

ラーメン二郎にまなぶ経営学

- or (roughly) -

Learning to Manage a Ramen Jiro

I have not picked up the book yet, so I canot vouch for the contents. Will do shortly. A potential holiday gift for the Japanese-speaking Jiro devotee on your holiday gift list.

Amazon.co.jp link