Yamadaya, Culver City, LA, CA

Day 2 LA

Ramen adventure continues.  Most of my colleague thinks I am crazy, ha.

Jess and I decided to go for Yamadaya in Culver City with no reason other than, it was closest to our office!

It was around 11:30am and we were the first customer.  The atmosphere is modern seating with the open kitchen on the left.  I have ordered Yamadaya Ramen with Tonkotsu Shoyu soup base.

Soup is more of a clear side of tonkotsu, where it is smooth and not as creamy.  Going to the noodles...

Thin and round noodles.  Not as much egg flavor but the normal factory made noodle. 

Chashu is actually somewhat more promising once you dip it longer in the soup.  The texture and chewiness is perfect.  Funny thing is that I do perfer Ramenya all kind of meat better. lol.

Later I found out that they actually have 6 locations! Amazing.  maybe another Ajisen in a making. lol.

Would recommend this place if it is close to your work and need to get your ramen in the system.

Ok! Back to work!

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Yamadaya - Culver City
11172 Washington Blvd
Culver City, CA 90232
Neighborhood: Culver City
http://www.ramen-yamadaya.com/index.html


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Ramenya, Los Angeles, CA

Day 1 LA

I am still amazed that I sticked it out to drive 6 hours right after I landed in SFO.  Must be crazy. 

I did research ramen places before we all went out to eat.  I have to give shout out to GoRaman in giving me some insight on the ramen places in west LA.  After Keizo left for Japan in 2008, lot of new places actually opened up.  

We have decided to come to Ramenya since it is already later in the day.  First thing I noticed is that this place only accepts benjamins, which alerted me with only Hong Kong dollars in my wallet. lol.  I have ordered shoyu ramen with extra spanish and boiled egg.    

Lot of reflection as you can see from the flash I enabled.  The soup is very filtered out and smooth after sipping in.  It is not in the heavy category but it certainly has the original just right not too salty or sweet.  The best part of this bowl is the chashu actually. 

The fat and the meet is just right balanced and very crummy and full of taste.  The meat does not need any hard bite and it would fall apart.

This place actually reminded me of Tempopo in Jtown SF, run by older Japanese folks.  I would like to say that it is like a food court style (食堂) in Japan, where all kind of ramen soup is served.  Would definitely recommend if you would like to try a lighter style of ramen for a change.

Thanks you guys for hanging!

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Ramenya
11555 W Olympic Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90064
Neighborhood: West Los Angeles
http://www.yelp.com/biz/ramenya-los-angeles#query:ramen
http://www.ramenya-usa.com/


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Butao Ramen(豚王), Central, Hong Kong；Hing Kee 避風塘興記, Jordan, Hong Kong

Hong Kong Day 1-4 (haha)

I cant believe that my vacation went by quickly.  Vacation always can be extended. lol. 

After brunch with a friend that came to HK to be grind for work and a dim sum lunch with relative, I came by this ramen place with my cousin in Lan Kuai Fong in Central district in Hong Kong.  This shop is called buta-oh (豚王) which is a subsidiary to Tokyo Chain Ramen, Nagi (凪).  Usually the line is around 40 minutes but I was lucky thanks to my cousin..

 

Everything here can be customizable, including the soup density, noodle density, and the toppings.  I have ordered the basic tonkotsu ramen with chashu topping.  The soup is basic tonkotsu taste without a heavy density.  It does not look like they cook the soup that long.  The noodle is thin round noodle where the chewiness is the Japanese bounce, which is good.  This place can be compared to the regular Ippudo Ramen, where the shop is actually around the corner.  lol. 

Ok. Lets go to the better food!!!  My long time friend Adam brought me to this place around Jordan Station, Hing Kee (興記).  It was very nice for him to bring me here cause I was craving for good local HK food.  To add to this, tons of celebraties have come to have a bite. To start off: BBQ Duck with rice noodle.  Ultimate Classic. 

The soup is clear chicken broth combine with some BBQ sauce from the duck.  Wait, it does get better:

 Saute Crab with the shop special sauce.  The Taste is like doubanjiang (豆瓣醬) added the XO sauce.

To end on the high note, just want to entertain you.  It is good to have girls selling alcohol in club, does not matter if it is beer or Remy. lol.

If you cant read Chinese, you can follow the Google Map below.
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Butao Ramen (豚王)
中環蘭桂坊和安里8-13號和安樓地下
Open Rice Link

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Hing Kee (興記)
尖沙咀彌敦道180號寶華商業大廈1字樓
http://www.openrice.com/english/restaurant/sr2.htm?shopid=16945


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Menya Fujishiro (麺屋 藤しろ), Meguro, Tokyo, Japan

Day 4 Tokyo

Why not the  last bowl before leaving town?  Why not try something new again?

Yes!

Brought me to Meguro Station in Tokyo where tons of Ramen shop resides here.  I found this place by reading  the ramen magazine I bought where I said that it is up and coming ramen place in 2012!  I hope I was not tricked. Lol.

The shop is call Fujishiro (藤しろ) and it is around 2 minutes walk from JR Meguro Station.  Amazingly I recognized this place because I was here 2 years ago at the same location but the previous time it was a failure.  I am glad to say that Tokyo is improving!  Yes! We need change!

I have ordered Special Chicken Broth Soup ramen (950yen).  After sitting down at the counter, customer keeps coming in.  Concentrated at my bowl of ramen, I even forgot to take a picture.  Here are the 2 pictures I took!

The soup is a dense chicken broth soup  which is smooth and warming going down the throat.  The chashu is said to be …  and I find it interesting that this is very similar to the one I had in ittou(一燈) 2 days ago, where it is very much like a ham, chewy, tasty, juicy.  Now I know that there is a reason why this place is climbing in ranking  in Ramen Database.  Do give this new place which opened 2 month ago a try!

The other crave. 3 meals of sushi in 4 days…

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Menya Fujishiro (麺屋 藤しろ)

東京都品川区上大崎2-27-1 サンフェリシタ目黒

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menya Ittou 一燈, Shin Koiwa, Tokyo Japan

Day 3 Tokyo

A raining day in Tokyo injected to my eager to have a better bowl of ramen! lol.

Today I visited 2010 opened ramen-ya, Menya Ittou (麺屋 一燈). It was such a long traveling with 2 changing Metro lanes! Menya Ittou is located in Shin-Koiwa station around 10 stations outside of Tokyo.  The shop is around 5 minute walk from the north exit in shin-koiwa.

Wednesday lunch time around 12:30 in a raining day, 10 people in line!  They have asked all the customer to purchase food ticket first.  I have ordered their top popular item, Special dense seafood tonkotsu tsuke men,特製濃厚魚介つけ麺.  950yen.

After sitting down at the counter, they have displayed all the glory the store has received, such as number 1 in tsukemen, number 1 in shio. etc. The quickly rising star still amazed me that they only have opened for 2 years. 

They even have hair clipper for gals! First time I saw this in a ramen shop, or any shop really.. 

Ramen. Yum!! Same as advertised! The housemade noodle is a big plus where the chewy rate is very high.  The more interesting thing is that the chashu tasted like 4 pieces of ham where it blends in with the thick soup!

The soup is dense and seafood heavy flavored.  There are actually 2 chicken meatball in the soup which it does added some more flavor. After dipping the noodle in the soup, the noodle is always very slimy and chewy, which is a little bit different than other stores.

Afterwards, I visited Tokyo Contemporary Museum around 3 stations away!

The Museum is exhibiting "Art and Music" from Japanese artest around the world.  A lot has to deal with old radio and track players on the sounds of broken radio.  

One of my favorite art piece! All from left over hardware!

Pudding from the museum shop!  Kind of weird with ice but it is very tasty.

Fun continues!!

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Menya Ittou 麺屋 一燈
東京都葛飾区東新小岩1-4-17


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麺屋 優創 (Yusaku), Tokyo, Japan

Day 1 and a half - Tokyo.

After tasting the nama hotate at the revolving sushi store double confirmed that the best food is still in Japan!  Unbelievable! Why cant the hotate in the states can be that tasty?  the whole hotate with the salted rice complete feel the gap between my mouth.  yes, I like it huge.

To add into the excitement, right after I got off the plane yesterday around 430, completely rushed into the city to put down my stuff and took off to one of my favorite ramen place in shin-okubo (新大久保) where their crab miso is second to none.  There are many miso ramen places in tokyo but the deep and ingrained crab miso places is scarce. The place is call Yusaku (優創) and it is around 10 minutes walk from Shin-okubo station.  It is hard to imagine a korean dominent part of town can also contain such an unique ramen local ramen shop!

Of course, with all miso ramen there has to be corn topping!!  once you take in the soup the crab yoke taste would fill your mouth and stay there for a long while! The soup is not a straight shot of broth but with the miso, vegitable, seafood ingredients.  One of the features is actually the noodle of this bowl, 

The noodle is flat noodle where the noodle shop makes everyday.  With the flat noodle, it would soak up the soup a lot faster and blend a lot quicker than the round ones.  You can actually see the effect if you leave the noodle too long in the soup!  

Amazingly this is the first time I took a picture with the chef!!  Such a nice guy! 

Also want to thank Ann and Lulu to wait for me for ramen.  A delay of United flight and flight experience is just another long crazy story that cant be finished with blogging. lol. 

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麺屋 優創 (yusaku)

東京都新宿区百人町2-19-11 サニーコープ エトナ1F

食べログ

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Misoya, Santa Clara, CA

Want to thank you to all that come to read my blog.  I am seeing the trouble of linking my blog to the social media pages.  Does anyone has any ideas?

Want to congratulate 49ers win today! It was a down to earth defense football game.  But, Alex Smith is actually hitting bogie today, hitting 3 big 3rd down conversions! Because the football game, I went for ramen around 5.  Thought that I can squeeze into Orenchi's busy line, but I was wrong!!  The line today was completely out the door.  Wanting to come back earlier to watch the game,  I went to Misoya instead.  Sitting at the bar area with most of the restaurant empty, I ordered Tokyo miso tonkotsu ramen with egg and corn on the side.  It was the right decision. 

The soup is dense and thick.  I feel like this miso is a mix of both white miso and red miso, where the it gets the best out of both taste.  Also, in the soup there are couple clams which add to the effect of the white miso.  The used noodle is medium size noodle.  My favorite part about this bowl is the egg and the corn.  Corn and miso soup is basically perfect together.  The sweetness of corn and the sour from the miso.  yum! 

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Misoya

3541 Homestead Rd

Santa Clara, CA 95051

www.misoya.net

http://www.yelp.com/biz/misoya-santa-clara-2

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Santouka, San Jose, CA

I miss the 24 hour ramen all the time in Tokyo.  Hardly any are open after 2pm in they bay area.  Tough for someone routinely overslept! (Sigh)..

But, the food court in Mitsuwa is always open in the afternoon! lol.  I was here 2pm today and there is barely a line for Santouka (山頭火).  Unfortunately Shio ramen was out of soup, which made me switched to miso.  Add an boiled egg on the side.

Although it is thought to be fast service, a normal 15-20 minute wait was normal at santouka (maybe only I am getting that treatment? ha).  In the bowl there are chashu, green onion, bamboo shoot and the extra egg I ordered.  The soup is more of a pork bone (tonkotsu) based with miso boiled in.  Although the soup is not as dense and flavorful as some other ramen places, it is easy to take in and the miso flavor would slowly takes effect.  The chashu's flavor is compatible with the soup as well with the soup flavor more dominent.  The less saltiness and the taste of this bowl might be tailored toward of an international taste.

Wanted also to post the $1 bucks oyster happy hour at the B in SF.  I did wish the oyster was bigger though. lol..

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Santouka
Mitsuwa Marketplace
675 Saratoga Ave
San Jose, CA 95129
http://www.santouka.co.jp


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B Restaurant
Yerba Buena Gardens - Upper Terrace
720 Howard St
San Francisco, CA 94103
http://www.bsanfrancisco.com

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Dohatsuten, Palo Alto, CA

Peer pressure is hard to avoid! but, when you are hungry, just go with it!

Based on previous 2-3 experiences, my feeling toward this ramen place was more toward below neutral.  Luckily this time I was prepared with reading the comments on yelp.  6 of us came in around 8pm to Dohatsuten in Palo Alto and I have ordered Tai-niku ramen with tonkotsu soup.

The taste was more than OK in my mind this time around! Although the pork bone taste was not as strong as the other shops in the bay, it was good enough and identifiable.  The noodle is the thin egg noodle which is similar to the shio ramen noodle used at other shops.

The pork belly is thick and hard to chew unless it is soaked with the soup.  It would be nice to get some fat on there! Such a meat lover..

After this experience, I would like to give them another try and come back to try their tsukemen.  My colleague ordered it and said was good.  Also, they are so close to work place. lol.

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Dohatsuten
799 San Antonio Rd
Palo Alto, CA 94303
http://www.yelp.com/biz/dohatsuten-palo-alto


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Ringer Hut, San Jose, CA

Champion vs Champon. I cant tell the difference..

Japanese Champon started in Nagasaki, which is the very southern tip of Japan.  At that time, Nagasaki has many of foreigners studying or doing business.  Champon is actually started from a Chinese Fukien student who misses this own culture and food.  Because Champon gathers many different ingredient, including veggies which is very expensive in Japan.

Ringer hut is a chain from Japan and Champon is one of the star item.  With a high Yelp rating, I ordered champon and yakimeshi!

Yakimeshi is very tasty! All the taste from the shoyu and ingredient is soaked in.  On the other hand,  although the small champon is very tasty as well, I felt a little bit discomfort with the spikes after sipping the soup.  But the amount of extra ingredient is a pleasant surprise.  At the end I just cant help myself to order.....

PUDDING!!!!! So good!! The caramel layer on the top has that solid layer to differentiate itself!











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Ringer Hut
1072 Saratoga Ave
San Jose, CA 95129
http://www.ringerhutamerica.com


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Suzu Noodle House, San Francisco, CA

Japantown is where Japanese culture started to flourish and it is currently one of the must go tourist sites in San Francisco.  Has to be good ramen in Japan town, where it took me to Suzu Noodle house on the first floor of the Japantown building.

Some odd reason I was craving for kakuni (fat pork meat).  I actually did ask for Kakuni ramen with Shio ramen but they claim that it is better with shoyu.  No! I pay for what I get! lol...

Shio Ramen with Kakuni on the side! I actually came here couple times before and have fallen in love with the shio ramen here.  It is based of chicken bone with fish broth.  It matched very well with the chewy egg noodle.  You actually have to eat the noodle instead of just swallow it.  The kakuni is marinated very well with the heavy soy sauce and sugar.  Fat part is completely juicy.  I did actaully put the kakuni in the soup and still taste fantastic!

I would like to say that I like the clear, straight forward taste from Suzu.  Katana-ya in SF actually have the very similar ramen but the atmosphere in Suzu is a lot better and cleaner.  Plus plus!

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Suzu Noodle House
1825 Post St
(between Webster St & Fillmore St) 
San Francisco, CA 94115
http://www.yelp.com/biz/suzu-noodle-house-san-francisco


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Orenchi, Santa Clara, CA & Miyabitei, San Jose, CA

My crave on curry udon was meet today!  well, kind of.  It reminded me of Shinagawa 品川 station's udon shop in tokyo.  Main three words, hot, cheap and fast.  The only difference is that lot of time to spare here.

The place is called Miyabitei in Mitsuwa market in San Jose. All their food is very cheap and big portion.  The curry udon is actually 5 dollars a piece!  There are actually beef chunk in the bowl.  Although the beef is not as chewy, sometimes is very hard to chew, it is what the price is.  Would be nice to have a bowl of rice for the rest of the curry sauce, but instead.. I got.... 

Sushi! lol. 

Of course, I would also like to write about Orenchi the second time on my blog.  I do believe that they have the best tsukemen in the bay area so far I have tasted.  The soup is dense and full of flavor of pork bone.  I ordered tsukemen with extra noodle, egg and tokyo negi.  So hungry! 

The way to eat tsukemen is to dip the noodle in the dipping soup, which should be very dense in flavor.  The other topping can also be dipped.  What I liked to do is to put all the topping in the soup first. lol.

The noodle with the soup is the closest taste I had comparing to the ramen experience in Japan.  After dipping the noodle in the soup, the soup flavor would dominate.  The tokyo negi would just add to the texture! yum. 

At the end, if you would like to enjoy the soup, you can ask for wari soup (割スープ）which can be pour into the dipping soup.  The wari soup here is actually white pork bone soup which matched perfectly.

The only complaint about Orenchi I have is that their service is ways slow.  I do not blame them since there are only 4 employee taking care of the whole store.  If you are going make sure to save sometime to complete your meal! 

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Orenchi ramen

3540 Homestead Rd
Santa Clara, CA 95051

http://www.yelp.com/biz/orenchi-ramen-santa-clara

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Miyabitei
675 Saratoga Ave
San Jose, CA 95129

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