When someone puts his heart and mind into perfecting his craft, the result can be amazing. But sometime it takes extraordinary talent too. And I am not talking about music making.
Ramen Break Beats is the hottest ramen-ya that took the Internet by storm. Located about a 20 minute walk from Meguro, Naka-Meguro, and Yutenji stations, this eatery is not exactly in a popular location so choose your subway station wisely when deciding where to walk from. Easiest is just catch a cab from these stations.
Break Beats is the brainchild of DJ Yanase (yep, that’s him at the stove), who’s a big fan of hip hop…and ramen. What started out as a simple hobby in Toronto eventually became a full-blown ramen obsession. DJ Yanase chose Yutenji 祐天寺in Meguro City as the site for this new ramen shop. Inside, his two passions are on full display – music and ramen.
As for the ordering, there is a ticket machine inside and while they don’t have English on the machine, the master lived and worked in Canada for a number of years and he is fluent in English so he will be more than happy to point you in the right direction. But he was simply too busy, so it’s better that you have a Japanese friend along than trying to figure out with Google translate.
特上盛塩らぁ麺 Special (Tokujyo) Chicken and Clam Double Soup Salt Ramen
The delicious, lip smacking soup for the salt ramen is made by blending a concentrated salt sauce made with Lake Shinji clams 宍道湖しじみ and layering the flavour of the shellfish with clear chicken stock made from local Amakusa Daioh chicken 地鶏天草大王の掃湯 (サオタン).
The utensils are 小石原焼き Koishiwara ware from Fukuoka 福岡, where the owner is from, and made to order.
The slightly alkaline noodles are specially made by Mikawaya Noodle House 三河屋製麺, and two different types of noodles are made for the shio (salt) and shoyu (soy sauce) ramen. The ones for shoyu is chewier than the ones for shio. The noodles were cooked to al dente. If you want it softer, you have to ask the chef specifically.
トッピング Toppings
Everything used in the ramen can be traced to an artisan producer and was incredibly well prepared and I can’t even imagine how much time goes in to making each one.
The toppings of the ramen, for both the salt and soy sauce versions, are changed according to the four seasons. The chef is very particular about the origins of the ingredients, for example the seaweed sheets 海苔 are from Ise Bay 伊勢湾, the sous-vide pork shoulder loin 肩ロース低温煮込み焼豚 made from Iwanaka pig 岩中豚.
The popular fried enoki フライドエノキ is specially put on instead of bamboo shoots. I really enjoyed this unique toppings. Under the enoki was the seasonal espuma mousse 季節のエスプーマ ムース, which in this case was a special cream cheese mousse.
For the purists, it can be changed from fried enoki to bamboo shoots メンマ (menma). And the menma is specially sourced from Itoshima 糸島.
This is a special sous-vide smoked charsiu 低温スモークチャーシュー that is made from Yamaguri pig loin やまゆり豚. Tasted like ham.
This was the special ingredient of the season, a piece of longtooth grouper 九繪 (kue) that was torched to bring out the fattiness of the fish for the season. The chewy skin tightened with the aburi and became crunchy.
I was surprised to see this wonton ワンタン in the bowl of ramen. The filling of the wonton was minced shrimp and pork and made perfectly round. Looked like a comet floating in the stock.
炊き込みご飯 Special Cooked Rice
As everyone can only order one bowl of ramen, for the big eaters like me, an additional bowl of rice would be needed. In most ramen-ya, it would be just a bowl of plain rice for you to dump into the remaining soup. Here, the chef prepared limited seasonal cooked rice 限定ご飯 based on the ingredients he can get his hands on.
The special rice we had was a soy sauce chicken with bonito flakes. It reminded me of braised turkey rice 火鸡饭 from the night markets of Taiwan.
Break Beats is only open Tuesday to Sunday from 11:30-15:30. However, in order to reduce the number of people waiting outside their shop, they implemented a signup sheet system which becomes available in the morning to reserve your time slot for the day. They say the list comes out at 9:45 am, but you’ll probably want to show up by at least 9:15 as they are known to draw lines even for the release of their signup sheet.
I can see them getting longer lines as they just got a Michelin nod with the Bib Gourmand recognition in the latest edition of the French tyre guide. Because this place is way too popular for me to just pop in any time soon, it could be my first and last time here. Whatever the case, definitely recommend making a visit.
Ramen Break Beats
4-21-19 Meguro, Meguro-ku, Tokyo, 153-0063, Japan
Visited Dec 2023
PS: Just two days after I went to the store, the wonderful news that they received the Bib Gourmand came. Good things come to those that truly deserved them.
Michelin Tokyo Guide 2024 Bib Gourmand
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