My First Time Trying Ichinoana Tsukemen (Dipping Noodles)
Meow meow, long time no see, everyone! Time just keeps slipping away before I even notice, but I’ve finally got a moment to expand our ramen empire~ This time I went to Ichinoana Tsukemen (a dipping-noodle specialty shop). I got there around 17:20 and walked straight in with no line 🥰. Every time I run into a place with no wait, this blissful look just spreads across my face all on its own.
Storefront, wait time, and the details
Full details for Ichinoana Tsukemen specialty shop on Google Maps: https://goo.gl/maps/1qFXkeSUmTPSJ5qF8
The shop is designed in light tones, and even the sign is white, which makes it feel really clean and pretty spacious. Seating is a counter bar, and behind the bar there are some tables grouped for four, so it works whether you’re going solo or rolling in with a group of friends. There was a little hiccup before I even got inside: I saw a pair of customers waiting outside the door and assumed there was a line, so I stood off to the side and waited too. Turns out they were just waiting on a takeout order. Good thing they kindly gave me a heads-up, otherwise I might still not have eaten my noodles by now 🥲.
The texture of the noodles and how the toppings taste
I ordered the pork-and-chicken loaded tsukemen, and it arrived around 17:35, which is pretty fast for dipping noodles~ As expected from a specialty shop, they’ve clearly drilled every step until it’s second nature. Unlike Menya Musashi’s tsukemen, Ichinoana’s version uses cold noodles dipped into a hot sauce, which is exactly the reverse of the former. That makes the noodles turn out cold and firm rather than springy. Even so, it delivers a totally different experience, and the moment I took a big bite I was caught off guard… “Huh!? You can actually do it this way? It doesn’t even have that powdery, floury mouthfeel!” (Personally, I really can’t stand that texture.)
The whole bowl is cold except for the dipping sauce, even the sous-vide meat! While I was eating the sous-vide piece, I kept wondering whether there was chicken skin on top, because one side of it was covered in a thin, chewy layer of skin? I honestly couldn’t tell, so can anyone help me solve this mystery…
There was a piece of sea grapes on top of the noodles, and the instant you bite into it, the taste of the sea bursts open, almost like being back to the moment a fisherman plucks it from the water and it stains his hands with its flavor. It’s not as briny-rich as caviar; instead it’s a just-enough taste that your tongue locks onto and remembers, the kind that isn’t overwhelming yet impossible to ignore. On top of that, there were some shredded daikon radish on the noodles, and when I got to it I had this “Uh? What are you doing here? What’s this about?” feeling. Maybe I’m too young to get it, but I have no idea why it’s there. My current guess is that it’s meant for when you add the soup?
The chashu is a thick cut, and eaten on its own it comes off dry and tough, to the point that I momentarily thought I was eating chicken breast. But it gets a lot better once you add the dipping sauce, and you also pick up a faint mustard aroma that tingles your tongue without being too sharp. The chashu itself is slightly salty while the sauce isn’t, so they balance each other out perfectly, and what you actually taste is a touch of the sweetness from the pork bone. So jot this down quick: you absolutely have to dip the chashu in the sauce.
The second way to eat tsukemen: after adding soup
The shop also thoughtfully provides soup to dilute the dipping sauce, giving you even more to experience. Once you add the soup it turns into something like a thick soup, and you’ll be surprised to find that this dipping sauce actually makes a pretty decent soup on its own. You’ll also notice the shop put in a little extra effort by pre-mixing things like onions and minced meat into the sauce, so the soup never gets boring to drink. That said, if this is your first time adding soup, let me strongly warn you: don’t add too much, or it’ll turn into plain water…
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