ippudo: the real deal

April 6th, 2010 | food, manhattan

i’ve never been to japan, so i really cannot say with any authority that ippudo is the real deal, but from what i can tell this is as close to japan as i’m going to get without crossing the pacific.  i’ve been hearing about this place forever, and i knew it was a chain and all over japan so maybe i wasn’t so enamored.  however, my friends who come here all the time (they live near by, lucky ducks), finally convinced me while we were having dinner at robataya that ippudo is a must visit.  and our friends who went with us to ippudo have parents from japan, and go there often so i was in good hands.

of course, we had to have the ramen, called the original shiromaru hakata soup, and it was excellent.   the bowl was filled with briny broth along with slices of pork, beansprouts, pickled ginger, sesame and scallions along with that lovely soft, runny poached egg.   we also tried the akamaru modern with their “special” sauce — flavored with miso and some garlic.  i preferred the traditional broth, not quite as heavy and more on the healing side of things (think really great chicken soup), though both had noodles prepared just right.

the ramen was the highlight for us. we also tried the spare ribs (good, nice flavor) as well as the steamed buns (not terribly exciting, and if you love momofuku’s you won’t like these).  unfortunately they didn’t have any shishito as they are supposed to be amazing, and i wanted to see how they compared to the ones at tia pol.  in other random information, in case you’re interested, the ippudo website is full of the history of ramen along with some very odd references in their promotional materials.  apparently, because their pork no longer has the usual smell of pork they have succeeded in winning “over female customers tempting them to want to try it everyday.” hopefully, just a translation error.   while i probably prefer the ramen at momofuku (it was my first), ippudo is somewhere to get ready for my long overdue trip to japan!  ippudo, 65 4th avenue between 9th and 10th streets, manhattan, new york, .

asian, east village, food, japanese, manhattan , , ,
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