Hide-Chan Ramen
248 East 52nd St
New York, NY 10022
So, this girl loves her seafood, but at heart, I’m a porker. Seriously. Two weeks ago when Grub Street
reported on a Hakata ramen place opening up where Torys used to be, I
made a bee-line. We got in around 7-8pm and waited 5 minutes for a table
to clear up. The service was fast and nice and we waited to get our
bowls of ramen with drafts of Sapporo. (They also have bottles of Kirin)
5 minutes after our ramen order, we saw two plates of gyoza go by and
it smelled amazing. We flagged a waitress down and ordered a plate when
she told us there is a 10 minute or so lag for these gyozas (where I
knew I made the right decision) and that they might come after our
noodles. Uh, dude… does this face look like a face that cares?
Listen. Get the gyoza. It was pretty
incredible. I think it beats gyoza you can find anywhere else. The meat
is flavored, the dumpling layers are thin and silky and charred on one
side, and the sauce they give you doesn’t overpower the dumpling, it
isn’t too tart. They even give you some yuzu koshou (pepper) to give it a
little bite. For only $5, it’s a winner. Order 2 plates, even.
Other things I saw on the menu were pork
buns and mentaiko (salted roe) on rice, both of which we didn’t try.
Next time. The ramen menu, of course, is fully rounded with their
tonkotsu hakata men, and then variations of extra pork, spicy, and
roasted garlic. They also had different “men” or noodles, which are
thicker. Finally, they also have tsuke-men hot or cold like in the
fashion of Setagaya. The choices aren’t nearly as extensive as Menkuitei
(who is all over the map – with no specialty, really) but large enough
for all but they all retain a certain Hakata character. Really well
done. I forgot to mention, they also have a miso and shoyu (soy sauce)
option.
I ordered the Tonkotsu ramen with
roasted black garlic called, Kuro Ramen (Black Ramen) and Ryan got the
Spicy Tonkotsu Ramen with their special rayu sauced called, Kara Ramen
(Spicy Ramen). I will say that the Kuro Ramen comes with a huge lump of
roasted garlic on the side and the broth of the regular Tonkotsu ramen
before mixing was amazing. The roasted garlic added a real smoky burnt
flavor that was amazing on the noodles. However, fell short of the “I
want to drink every last drop,” measure of broths. By the end the garlic
broth tasted too burnt and not enough garlicky. Ryan claimed that he
recognized the paste as something Ippudo puts in their broth in small
amounts. However, I was sneaking spoonfuls of Ryan’s Spicy Ramen broth,
which was pretty damn spicy in the first spoonful, but managed to not
get overwhelming as time went on. Finally, the pork belly that comes
with the ramen doesn’t quite beat Ippudo, but is fatty, soft and tender.
I think the kind that came with our bowl is different then the soy
sauce marinated with brown sugar pork that is featured in some of the
other concoctions in their menu… which I would be interested in trying.
Having tried the hot ramens, Ryan is a
tsukemen kinda guy, so he’s going to have that. I might stick to the
regular tonkotsu ramen or spicy ramen. Although what was REALLY killer
was couple of spoonfuls of my garlic broth in the spicy ramen. Amazing.
Over all, the ramen’s satisfied both of us and was more than enough in
terms of portions. It was generous, but not too much and the price point
of $10 is much better than Ippudo. Ippudo still has a special place in
my heart, but this place definitely usurped Setagaya (where I would
still go in a pinch). The feel is similar to Totto (yakitori – still
haven’t tried Ramen Totto – not really a chicken broth kinda gal), which
is understandable because they are sibling restaurants. I guess Ramen
Totto’s porkier half.
On our way in, we bumped into an
acquaintance of ours from the concert scene and he apparently comes here
all the time. He loves the tonkotsu ramen. Also, right when we were
leaving there were couple of Japanese people that came in (most of the
other customers were Japanese of the young punk fashion type of crowd)
exclaimed, “UMAI!” in his first slurp of noodles. So, definitely check
this place out.
