Kita-Senju is on my running route, so I end up there quite a lot. This time I visited Matador, a place famous for its gyukotsu (beef bone) ramen. Matador means bullfighter, which may or may not be a fitting name for a ramen shop that makes its broth from beef bones.. I can’t quite decide.
The front entrance
I arrived on a weekday, right around closing time, and there were still a few people lined up ahead of me. I can’t even imagine how long the line gets on weekends.
Shoyu ramen with all the toppings
Instead of chashu, they top it with roast beef. The broth is similar in style to Naju gomtang, but a bit sweeter and fattier. Beef bone soup is something you hardly ever come across in Japan, so I was really glad to have it. A bowl of seolleongtang at a Korean restaurant in Akasaka runs about 2,000 yen, and here you can have this for half the price, which makes it all the better.
The noodles
Unlike typical ramen noodles, these are slick and smooth, and somehow reminded me of naengmyeon. Maybe that’s why they went so well with the broth. It felt like eating Korean food reinterpreted through Japanese cuisine, and either way, I really enjoyed it. I came here on purpose to ease my homesickness, since it didn’t look like I’d get to Korea this winter, and the irony is that not long after, I ended up going to Korea anyway.