[RAMEN] 茂助 Mosuke and 一蘭 Ichi-ran (from March 11, 2002)
Ramen This Week: 茂助 Mosuke and 一蘭 Ichi-ran
On Wednesday, it had been 10 days since my last bowl (at the false Aoba in Nakano), and I was approaching manic depression. Therefore I swore off my usual Wednesday night antics and went hunting for something new.
茂助 Mosuke
My guess is that this is supposed to be one of those ramen places that is fine for a date. Wrong.
The place is spotless and beautiful, with 60s era jazz playing in the background (I think it was Chet Baker when I was in there). You can surely be thankful that you won't stink when you walk out of there. Then again, that's because you can't smell anything in there. That's what I call a bad sign.
I went with the standard offering, Mosuke Ramen with an onsen tamago on the side. The cook took his sweet time to give me a bowl full of a reliable but unimpressive soup, a nameless, faceless mix of tonkotsu, niboshi, and some other fish extract (also sesame seeds). The flavor was subtle but soulless. In fact, I think you could probably come up with something similar by accident using hondashi, shoyu, and sugar. But I'm just being mean; despite being unmemorable, the soup was in fact passable. The noodles had great color and a reasonably good consistency and chewiness, but the surface area of the noodles were "rougher" and more frictional than I like. These noodles too were tasteless, which matches up perfectly with the establishment's commitment to having no guts. In fact, there were too many noodles. I say they should take some of that stuff back and just make it a free kaedama option.
Gu: The charsiu was not good. The onsen tamago was a bit overdone, and didn't do anything with the rest of the ingredients. They also sell a kakuni ramen, but I have a hard time imagining how the kakuni would taste good with the broth.
Gyoza: I tried this. There was shiso in the gyoza. No thank you.
Other comments: Compared to a lot of the crap around the office, this joint was actually above average. But the bastard was damn expensive. However, what makes this place almost worth it is the lunch set, which is a Mosuke ramen, rice, a few pieces of gyoza, and some dessert for less than 1000 yen.
一蘭 Ichi-ran
We finally went to this gimmicky joint for Friday lunch. Kekke-san is still recovering (although he insists he liked it). Anyway, for those of you who haven't been watching TV in the last 2 years, this place is a collection of isolated booths, where you can be at one with your ramen. (They originally marketed themselves as a 女性が入りやすいラーメン屋. Give me a break.) As a result, you don't see anyone -- not the person taking your order, not the person making your food, not the person next to you.
It is also "your ramen" in the sense that you choose everything about it. You select the taste intensity of the soup and its thickness or gloopiness. You select how much hot pepper and garlic you want. You can select charsiu or not, negi or not. And you choose the firmness of the noodles.
The result is that there's probably some decent tasting pot of tonkotsu goodness somewhere in this gimmicky shop, but then they add all these things to it because you told them to. That's what screws it up, because none of these ingredients have been adequately integrated and incorporated into the broth. Nonetheless, I left just enough of this stuff so I could order a half-kaedama. Instead of the first time, when I ordered the noodles katame, I got these kihon. It was the same.
Anyway, the joint looks and tastes like something out of "Blade Runner." (Deckard didn't look like he was enjoying his noodles all that much either, mind you.) All told, however, you could do worse in Roppongi, and this place is open 24 hours.
P.S. I had some Mito-han tsukemen at 金龍菜館 in Mito yesterday, too. But the wife has put me on another 7-day ramen probation, so I'll have to get back to you guys on this one.
On Wednesday, it had been 10 days since my last bowl (at the false Aoba in Nakano), and I was approaching manic depression. Therefore I swore off my usual Wednesday night antics and went hunting for something new.
茂助 Mosuke
My guess is that this is supposed to be one of those ramen places that is fine for a date. Wrong.
The place is spotless and beautiful, with 60s era jazz playing in the background (I think it was Chet Baker when I was in there). You can surely be thankful that you won't stink when you walk out of there. Then again, that's because you can't smell anything in there. That's what I call a bad sign.
I went with the standard offering, Mosuke Ramen with an onsen tamago on the side. The cook took his sweet time to give me a bowl full of a reliable but unimpressive soup, a nameless, faceless mix of tonkotsu, niboshi, and some other fish extract (also sesame seeds). The flavor was subtle but soulless. In fact, I think you could probably come up with something similar by accident using hondashi, shoyu, and sugar. But I'm just being mean; despite being unmemorable, the soup was in fact passable. The noodles had great color and a reasonably good consistency and chewiness, but the surface area of the noodles were "rougher" and more frictional than I like. These noodles too were tasteless, which matches up perfectly with the establishment's commitment to having no guts. In fact, there were too many noodles. I say they should take some of that stuff back and just make it a free kaedama option.
Gu: The charsiu was not good. The onsen tamago was a bit overdone, and didn't do anything with the rest of the ingredients. They also sell a kakuni ramen, but I have a hard time imagining how the kakuni would taste good with the broth.
Gyoza: I tried this. There was shiso in the gyoza. No thank you.
Other comments: Compared to a lot of the crap around the office, this joint was actually above average. But the bastard was damn expensive. However, what makes this place almost worth it is the lunch set, which is a Mosuke ramen, rice, a few pieces of gyoza, and some dessert for less than 1000 yen.
一蘭 Ichi-ran
We finally went to this gimmicky joint for Friday lunch. Kekke-san is still recovering (although he insists he liked it). Anyway, for those of you who haven't been watching TV in the last 2 years, this place is a collection of isolated booths, where you can be at one with your ramen. (They originally marketed themselves as a 女性が入りやすいラーメン屋. Give me a break.) As a result, you don't see anyone -- not the person taking your order, not the person making your food, not the person next to you.
It is also "your ramen" in the sense that you choose everything about it. You select the taste intensity of the soup and its thickness or gloopiness. You select how much hot pepper and garlic you want. You can select charsiu or not, negi or not. And you choose the firmness of the noodles.
The result is that there's probably some decent tasting pot of tonkotsu goodness somewhere in this gimmicky shop, but then they add all these things to it because you told them to. That's what screws it up, because none of these ingredients have been adequately integrated and incorporated into the broth. Nonetheless, I left just enough of this stuff so I could order a half-kaedama. Instead of the first time, when I ordered the noodles katame, I got these kihon. It was the same.
Anyway, the joint looks and tastes like something out of "Blade Runner." (Deckard didn't look like he was enjoying his noodles all that much either, mind you.) All told, however, you could do worse in Roppongi, and this place is open 24 hours.
P.S. I had some Mito-han tsukemen at 金龍菜館 in Mito yesterday, too. But the wife has put me on another 7-day ramen probation, so I'll have to get back to you guys on this one.
posted by hamu86 at 1:03 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home