Takumen

Summary

I was supposed to meet my partner the next block at Casa Enrique, but for some reason they mistook a Japanese restaurant for a Mexican restaurant and ended up here. They found it weird that there were no lines, whereas I went to Casa Enrique and encountered a line. Because Casa Enrique doesn’t take walk-ins and the line was getting rather long, we decided to just eat here, and to my surprise, it was a good substitute.

The haku highball had Suntory Haku craft vodka, yuzu infused highly carbonated club soda, and yuzu zest. I am generally not a fan of vodka soda drinks, but my partner did enjoy this. The hints of yuzu weren’t super prominent.

The Takumen chicken was fried karaage chicken with yakitori sauce. For how small this was, it was alright. The chicken was moist, and the dressing was sweet. It wasn’t as crispy as I would’ve liked it, but it was decent. Due to how small this was, it probably isn’t worth ordering by itself.

The soy garlic wings came with hongaeshi garlic soy sauce, fried garlic, and nira-chive. The wings were pretty tasty, partly due to the plethora of garlic and other flavors. The wings were a bit small, but they had a nice batter to them and were easy to eat.

The Hawaiian tuna poke came with poke sauce, tuna sashimi, seaweed salad, kombu cauliflower & broccoli, avocado salad, potato salad, nori seaweed, yukari cucumber, and shishito pepper. My partner ordered this and found it to be delicious. It’s not much different than most pokes, but all the ingredients were fresh and rightly seasoned.

The spicy goma miso ramen came with roasted black sesame, white sesame, spicy miso, sauteed ground pork, chashu pork, nira chives, bok choy, scallions, takumen broth, and thick noodles. Surprisingly, the thick ramen was very chewy with a good bounce to it. The rich broth was seasoned well, albeit some might think it was a little on the salty side. They give you a good portion size, and I was left pretty satisfied. One caveat is the chashu pork wasn’t the best that I’ve had. It was dry and somewhat chewy as if it wasn’t braised long enough. Nevertheless, this ramen was very good.

Service was fast and prompt, and they follow all COVID protocols. We were able to secure a seat dining at 5 PM on a Saturday without reservations.

Final Verdict

This place advertises as a izakaya, but the offerings are skim at the moment. They did not have any hand rolls and izakaya options are sparse compared to other places. However, if you desire a Japanese casual spot with choices, especially in poke and ramen, this place was actually pretty good.

Yelp Jabs

The ramen wasn’t that good. It wasn’t that hot. It’s not even flavorful. Also, it’s kinda pricey compared to some ramen places. Would’ve been worth it if the food were great, but it wasn’t.

This Yelper’s ramen picture looks like the wonton ramen. Unfortunately, they simply ordered wrong. Most ramen eaters know what to expect if you order just regular ramen. The broth is almost always going to be on the blander side.

This place is not authentic ramen in my opinion. Very westernized. Still not bad. However, small portions and a bit pricy in my opinion.

I’m not sure what caused a person, let alone an Elitist, to think this should have been authentic ramen. Nowadays, does that really matter? Even the Japanese ramen shops in the city will have some westernized influence in it.