The Ramen Shaman
May 16, 2013
The Ramen Shaman: Miso Ramen at Sumire (Sapporo)
Los Angeles to San Francisco. San Francisco to Tokyo. Tokyo to Sapporo. Plane to train to subway to foot. 33 straight hours of travel and my first meal in Japan made it all worthwhile.
Welcome to すみれ (Sumire). My couch-surfing hosts initially thought my ramen fixation was a cute diversion but quickly realized they were in over their heads.
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April 24, 2013
The Ramen Shaman: Mr. Ramen (LA)
A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, a man embarked on a quest was to eat at every ramen shop in Los Angeles. Mr. Ramen was on the list from Day One, but the man never visited.
You see, Mr. Ramen has a certain reputation. To put it bluntly, the man has never seen a good review from a reputable source.
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March 27, 2013
The Ramen Shaman: Men Oh (LA)
Men Oh hails from Tokushima prefecture on Shikoku Island, the smallest and least populated of Japans’s four main islands. Until the completion of the first of several bridge systems in 1988 the island was only accessible by ferry or plane, and to this day the mostly rural island flies under the radar.
Their ramen is no different. While Japan’s other three islands are all famous for their regional specialties — Hokkaido for its winter-warming Sapporo-style miso ramen (often served with corn and a couple slabs of butter); Kyushu for its pork-perfect Hakata-style tonkotsu ramen (stewed pork bones distilled to a creamy goodness); and too many to count on the central, main island of Honshu, like the traditional Tokyo-style shoyu ramen.
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February 27, 2013
The Ramen Shaman: Fuunji (Shinjuku)
On a dull, drizzling day in Tokyo I set out for my second-ever bowl of tsukemen (ramen dipping noodles). After its introduction in the early 2000′s, tsukemen has boomed in popularity, rising to a crescendo a few years ago and still going strong. Many, many shops in Tokyo offer both standard ramen and tsukemen, and the consensus is that the majority of the latter tastes relatively similar no matter where it’s eaten (although the quality varies).
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January 30, 2013
The Ramen Shaman: NoodleCat (Cleveland)
I was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio. Not exactly a ramen mecca, but times change. Ramen’s profile is ever-growing and in 2011 “celebrity chef Jonathan Sawyer” (that’s according to his bio, I guess he’s on tv or something) opened NoodleCat, Cleveland’s first ramen house.
Hometown ramen! I couldn’t wait to try it and finally got my chance over the Christmas holidays.
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January 16, 2013
The Ramen Shaman: Junk Garage (Tokyo Station)
If I gave you several options for dinner and you knew nothing about the restaurants other than their names, and one was called “Junk Garage”, you’re eating there, right? I’m going with Junk Garage every single time.
I heard about this shop through the usual ramen fanatic-suspects and was fascinated by their namesake ‘junk’ ramen, or mazesoba… a “mixed” ramen sans soup.
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November 28, 2012
The Ramen Shaman: Daikokuya (LA)
If you know anything about ramen in Los Angeles you’ve heard of Daikokuya, the original LA noodle institution. There are throngs of people waiting outside its bright yellow awning at almost any hour of the day, despite several other shops within viewing distance.
It was my first-ever ramen love.
I’ve written before about how I got into ramen – from being totally unaware of its existence (just two years ago!), to finding awesome English-language ramen blogs that I read through faster than the Harry Potter series, starting my own blog, and visiting Japan (twice).
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November 7, 2012
The Ramen Shaman: Miso Ramen at Kururi (Ichigaya)
My second day in Japan was inauspicious. The sky was dreary, overcast, drizzling all day and on into the night, and I woke up with a full-blown cold to boot. So in other words, the perfect day for a bowl of ramen.
After spending the day at the National Museum in Ueno Park, where my memories consist of stunning ancient sword blades, beaded necklaces from 500 BC that are the epitome of current hipster style, and having to run to the bathroom every 15 minutes to drain my flooded nose, I finally had my first shot at tasting one of the top ramen shops in Tokyo: Kururi.
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October 24, 2012
The Ramen Shaman: Jiro-kei Ramen at Senrigan (Kitazawa)
This one was a long time coming.
Since I first started reading about ramen over at Ramenate I’ve been fascinated by Jiro-kei (Jiro-style) ramen. What is Jiro you ask?
Jiro is an institution. It has spawned several official offshoots and many more imitators. Jiro is to ramen as suicide sauce is to wings. It’s the ultimate Man vs. Food event. Making it to the end of a bowl is an endurance test, and just finishing the toppings is exhilarating.
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October 10, 2012
The Ramen Shaman: Silverlake Ramen (LA)
It’s been just over a year since I started my ramen blog. At least six new ramen shops have opened in LA since then (a far cry from the one-a-day that are said to open in Tokyo, but still). I’ve learned more about soup than I could have ever imagined, I started learning Japanese, and I went to Japan. All these things happened because of ramen.
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