#kanada-ya

  I am a picky eater when it comes to Ramen. Ramen has often been associated with the most exciting food experiences of my life, as well as some of the most disappointing. The first being in Japan, the second being in London. Over the years, Ramen restaurants have flourished in London and you will find a lot of restaurants offering what they describe as “Authentic” Ramen. The broth is often fade,…

‎I should never have doubted myself.

But I went back, I had to. I really didn't quite believe what happened the first time. But upon my return my gut told me once again what the little voice in my head had been telling me over and over.

That meal is quite simply the finest thing I have ever eaten. I could come back here every day and eat the same thing again and again for the rest of my life.

There, I have said it. 

I am writing this whilst still sat here at the table. I need to commit my thoughts to text with my taste buds still pinging from my hastily eaten lunch.

I tried to eat slowly, to savour each mouthful, I tried to inhale the aromas of meal wholeheartedly wafting them and breathing in deeply, but it was all in vein. Eat. Eat now. Before someone takes it away.

It is the same with all of my fellow diners. It is as though we have all been duped by some strange vendor of Lotus and we eagerly take our fill in a quest to quench an ever lasting desire to quaff this nectar of the gods.

I'm in a Ramen bar near my office. Kanada-Ya.

It has just opened but already the queues outside the door are a sign of a pending collective addiction. There are less than 30 tables in this small eponymous restaurant.  All of them full.

They only serve two things. Ramen, bowls of soft unctuous noodles with slices of pork belly bathed in pork bone broth‎ with nothing else other than a garnish of spring onion, wood ear fungus and a sheet of crisp nori.

Onigiri rice balls stuffed with pickled plum or salmon wrapped in nori‎.

Two things done well. Or rather two things done with an obsessive attention to detail that means done well is an understatement of criminal proportions.  It is difficult to find the superlatives to express how brilliantly the sum of the parts come together in the bowl.

The star is the broth. Cloudy, creamy, salty, meaty, smooth and silky. There is much made, unpretentiously of the broth making process. Every second of the 18 hours of preparation is effortlessly apparent in the intense unami of this soup. The noodles are cooked to order, angel hair fine, mine were soft, bathed in porky brothy goodness. The pork is delicate in texture, intense in flavour, the onions, nori and fungus all there for texture. But none of the opportunity to add flavour is wasted.

30 years ago I watched the movie Tampopo in awe as the art of noodle broth was told as a way of life. 30 years ago Japanese food was exotic and rare. Now it is instantly ubiquitous and more about the conveyor belt than the food. Myths of sushi chefs training for 20 years before they pick up a knife are dispelled in favour of deskilled multi-skilled kitchen staff, prepping preprepared rice and fish.

But wow - Tampopo is alive and lives true in Kanada-Ya.

Watch the movie.

Eat the noodles.