Ikebukuro is the fiercest ramen battleground in Japan. There are countless shops, and hardly a single one of them isn’t a famous name. Out of all of them, I went to Nakamoto, which is supposedly the hot place these days.
Ikebukuro in the evening
The place stays lively until late at night. You can feel the energy of youth.
This is the shop.
It’s a little further in from Nishiguchi Park (West Gate Park). There’s always a long line outside, so it shouldn’t be hard to find.
The menu
Spicy is their specialty.
This is what the ramen looks like.
It’s the level Japanese people call really spicy, so for me it was pretty ordinary. I think it would be good with vegetables as a topping. It would go well with rice, too. Well… that aside… if you ask whether this ramen is really so delicious that it’s worth lining up for, it wasn’t… It isn’t just spicy ramen, though; there’s a hidden aftertaste of sourness and sweetness. That spicy-yet-tangy flavor seems to be the secret of its popularity with Japanese people, but for me as a Korean that kind of flavor is just too ordinary. Even the kimchi jjigae I make myself tastes better than this.
I think trying to express everything through ramen is a fresh idea… but I don’t feel any reason to be that obsessed with ramen. If you want something spicy, you can just eat kimchi jjigae. Eating the ramen here made me think that ramen should taste like ramen. For me, a place like Setagaya is that kind of shop.
Here are the noodles.
It does deserve a place among the famous shops, but I don’t think this one is meant for me.