Thursday, July 31, 2014

Ramen

We are a big fan of ramen.  We've been to a few good ramen places in the Bay Area.  But here in Tokyo, it's a whole new ball game when it comes to ramen.  Most of the ramen shops near our hotel are tiny with very few seats...a little hole in the wall type.  The ramen shop we were in, our little group of 10 literally filled up maximum capacity. 

First thing you do when you walk in is to go to the vending machine and order your choice of ramen.  Check out the menu in the photo.  After you select your ramen, you pay (cash only) and the machine spits out a tiny ticket.  You put the ticket on the counter in front of your seat.  Then the two "chefs" in the narrow kitchen go to work...boiling the ramen, steaming to heat up the bowls, putting the gyozas in the gyoza making gadget, etc.  Snap, crackle and pop...wa-lah... a steaming hot bowl of ramen with a mountain full of cabbage, sprouts, green onions, carrots gets delivered in front of you by the chef.   Pretty darn good I must say! 
$8.50 for a bowl or ramen.  Combo with gyoza is $9.20.  Not cheap.

Those are the little white tickets from the vending machine.

  This particular ramen shop emphasizes on eating lots of veggies.

After you happily slurp up your yummy ramen, you put the bowl back on the counter, you have to clean up your mess, wipe down the counter and say thank you and leave.  Pretty efficient, right?  No waitress jobs in this part of the world. 

You can ask for different hardness of noodles cause some prefer al dente and some soft.  You can get different flavor soups -- miso, salt, soy sauce, meat, etc.  On the vending machine, you can add different toppings...like butter or hot sauce. 

Shaeli, Samantha and Kira nearly polished their bowls.  Tati and Sam gave up about half way.  

No comments re UA food.  Okay...one comment.  I am glad I am not a frequent flyer.

Stay tuned for more...we are headed to the famous fish market today!

2 comments:

  1. LOVE it!! A RAMEN vending machine?? Awesome....it's a good thing Tati loves ramen - it's a staple at our house - not quite as fancy as these, however....

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