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

Funabashi Ramen Yokocho/Funabashi船橋らーめん横丁/船橋

  

Funabashi Ramen Yokocho. Not really anything worth traveling for, there's an Aobai but not much else to stir the soul. All the way in the back past the meat counter of some department store.

Gurunavi Page
Google Maps

Ramen Theater/One's Mall

     

Didn't eat here but this is another Ramen Theme Park in the Tokyo (Chiba) area, one of the last ones that I haven't been to already. Ramen Gekijou (劇場) = Ramen Theater. Several shops, but none that I had really heard of. One interesting thing about this place is that they seem to rotate the shops more frequently than other ramen theme parks. An additional listing of the current and past shops is here. However because this place is so out of the way, perhaps they get only second-tier shops or shops that are moderately famous in other parts of Japan, but not the Tokyo/Chiba headliners. Too far to walk from JR Inage Station (JR Sobu Line), you have to take a bus (from bus stop #1 on the east side of the station). Semi-outlet-type stores for cheap Chinese sneakers etc. also available for your shopping pleasure in the same building.

One's Mall Home Page
Google Maps

Tomita/Matsudoとみ田/浅草

  

With a score of 99.532 as I write this, Tomita is the #1 ramen shop in Japan according to Supleks Database. If you also want to make the argument that Japanese ramen is the best in the world, then I guess the logical conclusion is that this is the best ramen shop on the planet. Doesn't look like much from the outside though, but looks are deceiving as anyone who has spent any amount of time in Japan can tell you.

Tomita combines high-quality tonkotsu gyoukai broth, very thick and rich, puts chopped onions and menmas in it, and serves it up hot. The noodles are well done but are a shade darker and thinner than other similar places like Rokurinsha. The pork is slightly fattier than I would like but overall is quite good as you can see from the picture. There were about 25 people on line as I got there and my total waiting time before I sat down was about 1 hour. No benches, but fortunately it was a nice day outside, a rarity for the middle of August, and I was happy to be on line for ramen (and not at work, I took a vacation week). Is this ramen significantly different from other tonkotsu gyoukai places such as Naoji, Rokurinsha, etc. No, not in my opinion.

Make sure that as soon as you get to Tomita, you buy your ticket, even before you get on line, as they come out from the shop every 5-10 mins or so to take the tickets from the last few people on line. This enables them to tee up the proper amount of noodles in the pot so that your bowl is in front of you within a minute of you sitting down - this is a difficult trick to get right all day I guess.

Supleks page
One Coin Blog page
Google Map (check out Street View to to see the line)

Shoujin Kadofuji/Kashiwa City匠神角ふじ/柏市

 

Kadofuji is a member of the Kouji Dream group of shops - this also includes Tomita (next review, currently the #1 shop in Japan), a couple of Taishokens, and 25-3- other shops in the Kanto area. Kadofuji has been on television a few times and the emphasis there is always on the giant noodles and the heaping bowls of veggies and pork that are provided - sort of like Jiro (see some of the pics below). If you scroll down through the chain's home page below, you will see some of the examples and then also some of the stranger ramens that they have experimented with in the past. In any case today I went there to try their extremely thick tsukemen noodles with shoyu-yuzu dipping sauce. The emphasis at this shop is on very strong flavors. The yuzu dipping sauce was extremely potent and salty, I was almost looking for something to water it down with. A bit lighter on the yuzu ttaste (relative to the shoyu) would have helped also. I was unable to get the "baka buta" (バカブタ), the "stupid" amount of pork topping selection for 300 yen, since that was sold out already. However I only arrived at about 1 PM so if you want to get that one then better get there earlier. Note on the ticket machine they also have a special "collagen ball", recommended for women, that you can purchase as a topping for 100 yen (I didn't). Now the most importany thing in your bowl are the noodles, and these are some of the thickest around. fairly katame and almost as thick as the chopsticks at the thick end, these were excellent. You will be asked what size of noodles you want, the chuu-mori (370g) was enough for me, that was 3/4 pound of noodles. You can get even bigger sizes if you want and I believe that some of the TV shows that have highlighted this place show people getting 1.5 pounds, 2 pounds of noodles and then eating them all. Also not to be missed was the slightly fried shoyu garlic mixture in containers at each seat, you can see some of it on the menma in the picture.

The second-to-last picture above is actually that of a interestingly-owl-themed yakiniku shop a few doors down.

Shop page
Chain home page
Google Map

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.

O'TAQE's Blog
Diddlefinger Map (English labels)
Google Map

Kadobuji/ShinMatsudo山勝 角ふじ/新松戸

 

I saw a segment about Kadobuji on a Japanese ramen TV show, then I saw it on YouTube about a month later. This place will serve you any amount of noodles that you want, up to 3 kg (roughly 10 average-size servings in one bowl). I stopped there on my way to CEATEC at Chiba Makuhari Messe earlier this month. I didn't have the 3 kg ramen, luckily. I actually had the shoyu tonkotsu tsukemen. This place is about a 10-15 walk from Shin-Matusdo station so you may want to consider taking a taxi from there. The shoyu tonkotsu shiru is actually fairly "sweet", one of the sweeter ones I've had anywhere. The noodles were decently sized, perhaps a bit thin, and slippery. However they were thinner tsukemen-type noodles, not the thicker curly ones shown in the video. Also, when purchasing tickets at the ticket machine in the back of the store, a single buta (豚) ticket gets you four decent-sized slices. This shop and the Matsudo Ramen Jiro are definite recommendations for anyone who finds themselves in Matsudo City. Anyone who sends me a picture of themselves eating one of the Monster Ramen bowls, I'll be happy to post it.

Blog Entry
YouTube video of Kadobuji Monster Ramen (bakamori = "stupid" (big) size)
Diddlefinger Map (English labels)
Google Map

Ramen Jiro/Matsudoラーメン二郎/松戸駅前店

   

Jiro #21. In taste and style overall, this one was very somewhat similar to Jiro Meguro, but the shou (小) portion was a bit bigger, since the bowl itself was bigger than most shou's, roughly the same bowl size as Takadanobaba. The broth was perfect, basic simple Jiro taste, 1/16" layer of oil on top. The veggies were mostly moyashi rather than cabbage. The buta pieces were quite large in cross section, and thick too, and the base shou comes with two of them. The "buta single" ticket (actually a white plastic chip) gives 5, and the "buta double" W ticket gives 8. I can't imagine anyone being able to eat 8 of these so I recommend you don't get this one. Relatively clean store and there is a little brick ledge you can sit on outside while waiting. The noodles were a bit on the thin side, remember this since thinner noodles cook quicker and won't be as katame even if you ask for it, and it can frequently mean more of them, since they pack into the bowl better. Very nice overall. Granted it's a long trip here from the center of the loop (almost 20 mins west from JR Nishi Nippori station via the Joban-sen Rapid), so this one might be good if you are in the area.

ramentokyo.com Ramen Jiro Information Page
Pictures
More Pictures+Address
Google Map