Monday, September 21, 2009

石釜 (Ishigama in Omotesando)

石釜

DSC_1942

Miso ramen served in an iron pot? That's what you can get at Ishigama, located smack dab on Omotesando Street. Omotesando is an area of Tokyo known more for high fashion than cheap noodles. There are a ton of kick ass cafes in the area. Not so many ramen shops.

The menu is in multiple languages. Yes, this is a shop that caters to tourists. It's next to the massive Kiddie Land store, with 8 stories of Japanese character goods like Hello Kitty, Mameshiba, and of course Rilakuma. But that's for another blog. Let's eat some ramen!

DSC_1941

I can't recommend this spot.

It's standard stuff, but the thing that I think is whack is exactly what draws people here, the iron pot. The soup is served in a red hot stone bowl, much like Korean bibinba. The hot pot should keep the soup hot and tasty till the last drop. But...

This totally threw off my ramen "pacing". As ramen slowly cools, my bites become quicker, my slurps lenghtier, the silence in conversations longer. But the hot bowl, coupled with a decrease in liquid has the opposite effect, and the soup gets hotter as it gets smaller. That, and the taste was just so-so.

DSC_1936

Shop info here.







No comments: