kyoto ramen koji

we were just arrived at kyoto so we didn't want to go too far just for finding dinner, so we decided to find some good food at the station. the station has JR isetan department store in it, and it has fresh food or takeaway food at the basement and restaurant from 9F to 11 F, and there are two other dining place at the station, the cube and porta. so i imagined there must be something to eat. and husband was craving for another ramen, so we decided to go to kyoto ramen koji.

basically, kyoto ramen koji is a floor for several ramen shops from all over japan. there are 9 ramen shops and 1 desert cafe. you can check all available ramen in their website (here). i didn't think to check their website beforehand, but luckily, in front of the elevator there's this big lightboard that explained a bit about each ramen shops. it explained the area where it came from (from sapporo to tokyo) and the type of the ramen used and the soup, even the flavor characteristics, so you could pick the one that suits you best. at first, i thought it would be like food court setting, where you could buy from several stall and then sit in a large area. turned out i was wrong.

it was basically a bunch of restaurants on the entire floor. so you have to pick one and then go inside the restaurant and ordered. i think different restaurant has different seating arrangement, but i can't say for sure since we only went there once. i wanted to try the kyoto misutani or toyama todai one, but husband wanted to try hakata ikkousha (we used to had hakkata store in our home city, but they have closed their stores, leaving only one stall in one mall that we rarely go to) so since we both had to be in the same restaurant, i decided to just go with him instead of going separately. it wasn't any queue at hakata, but there was short queue in front of misutani later after we finished, so husband was curious whether it's really good or because the store is the first one at front after you came out of the elevator.

this is the description from the website about hakata ikkousha: the creamy pork bone soup is impressive! this is the ultimate pork bone soup. really creamy! come to a heaven woven from thinly sliced flat noodles. it has flat, fine noodles, and more toward rich flavor.

anyway, when you arrived at the store, there was a vending machine outside that actually had english menu but we couldn't find it at first. there was a waiter so we asked her about it, and she wasn't that fluent at english, but she understood what we were asking about and chose the english option and the menu changed into english but for a minutes or two. there were not much to choose from. basically everything was tonkotsu ramen (pork bone soup) with thinly sliced pork surrounding the bowl and there was the spicy version of it. there were several set, so you could get the ramen with karaage chicken or mentai rice. i picked the ramen and karaage set and husband picked the spicy one. after picking the menu that we wanted, we paid for it and gave the ticket to the waiter and then went inside and waited in our seats. price wise, i think it's similar to other ramen shops.

the vending machine
notice the green box on top left, it was the button that the waiter chose to change the language

the restaurant only had, i think about 3 long tables with small chairs facing it like counter model but without wall separator (no booth like ichiran). even though they said child are welcome, if you had small kids, i don't think they can sit on round chair without backing like that. and the place was really small, the alley was narrow. basically if the place were full, you could brush your elbow with other people elbow. anyway, they had several spices and condiments on the table and chopsticks, spoons, and even free water. you just have to grab it yourself. yay for free water! hahaha..

when the ramen bowl came, it looked like the one in the picture. but the size.. oh my.. it was big! and i immediately regret ordering a karaage chicken because the karaage chicken was also a big chunk! i thought it would be like bite size karaage like the one i had at home, but this one was really big. anyway... i didn't taste my husband's because i can't eat spicy food so i can't say anything about his ramen bowl. but mine.. the pork slices were generous. even though it's thin, but it was enough to finish the whole bowl without running out of pork slices. however, they put sprouts and lots of scallions on top, which i didn't like. so i had to put them aside to get the ramen underneath.

notice how the table was really crowded. it was the end of the table behind the brown jar that contained ginger and pickles.
the karaage was on the small plate, but trust me it was big.
you can see my overflowing ramen bowl

the ramen was thin and not soft enough for my taste. perhaps if compared to pasta, it would be just al dente. i wished it were softer. the soup was quite thick. it was definitely rich, had strong pork bone taste. they served it really hot. so i had difficulty eating a big bowl of it because it was so hot but since the soup was quite thick and rich, i had to finish it quickly or it would taste bad. perhaps i burned my tongue a bit having to finish it quickly. it also tasted a bit salty to my taste so i had to drink a lot to ease the saltiness. i completely forgot how it tasted back here because it's been so long since i had their tonkotsu ramen. the one sold in the shopping mall was chicken broth ramen, which was rich but it was not as rich as pork bone broth. but the karaage was totally similar to the one we had here! but they were smaller here. it had crispy skin and had lots of spices, i could even taste the hint of ginger in it. even the chicken meat was full of tasty spices. it was great, unfortunately i was full so i couldn't finish it. luckily we only bought one so husband finished the rest. i looked at other people beside us and one of them ordered the set with mentai rice. i couldn't imagine how she could manage to finish all of it since the ramen was quite big and the mentai rice was normal size portion, unlike the one we had at yazawa which came in smaller bowl.

anyway... we end the night really full and satisfy with ramen that we decided no more ramen for couple days. i definitely recommend this for those who like rich and thick pork bone broth soup. if you didn't like thick soup, you should skip it and try something else. i would definitely come back here but perhaps trying other shops, maybe the misutani one. i hope the queue wasn't lying..