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November 12, 2005
Soup for the New Yorker
I was in the mood for soup all day long yesterday, but too busy to go and get any. It was uncomfortably cold on the way to work. I should switch to my winter outfit of long johns, a heavy coat and heavy scarf, but I'm defiantly still wearing corduroy. Soup just seemed like the right thing to eat. I wasn't craving thick soup, though -- I wanted broth with noodles -- there's a Japanese noodle place on 56th and 6th Ave that would have been perfect. Matzoh ball soup also would have sufficed. Maybe I was dehydrated.
At some point during the day, while trying to strike a healthy balance between stressful work email and blog-reading procrastination, I read about the ramen noodle place Rai Rai Ken on Gothamist. Later, after watching Capote at Angelika (good movie, go see it), we went in search of it. Neither of us could remember the name or location (I had IM'd the URL to Derek but neither of us wrote anything down). We wandered all around Japanese row (9th St. btw 2nd and 3rd) and eventually visited the St. Mark's bookstore to find it in a book.
The search was worth it. It's on 10th street off of 1st Ave, and it's a tiny place with one long counter -- the kitchen's on one side, and a low counter for customers is on the other. There is only room to walk single-file to a counter stool. The place feels like it has been there for a while and it has a very comforting, cozy feel. Derek says it reminded him of Bladerunner, if that means anything to anyone (I haven't seen the movie). It feels like some friendly chefs have gotten together to cook you a warm, restorative meal. It also reminded me of a short (Japanese?) movie I saw once about a man trying to develop the perfect broth for noodle soup so he could open a lunch place. The movie ends up with a shot of business men all lined up at a similar counter eating soup with chopsticks and tipping their bowls up to finish the soup (a sign of really good broth). Anyone know what I'm talking about?
The menu at Rai Rai Ken is simple: there are three types of ramen noodle soup -- Shoyu (soy broth), Shio (seafood broth), and Miso. The menu also offers dumplings and a few other choices. Derek ordered the miso-based bowl of ramen with chicken, and I had the seafood-based broth with a boiled egg, seaweed, scallions, bamboo shoots, ramen, pork, and spinach (Shio). We shared some vegetable dumplings. The noodles were wonderful -- more chewy and tasty than the supermarket variety -- and my pork was really tender. I noticed some special prep work happening on our way out that seemed to involve meat and wool and wrapping -- perhaps a method of cooking the pork and retaining flavor?
We felt very pleased with ourselves when we finished (and grateful to Gothamist and the blogging world in general, the source of many good food experiences lately).
Posted by csageday at November 12, 2005 06:46 PM
Comments
Cool, I found a fellow NYC/Brooklyn food lover. Just saw your blog on the nycbloggers site. Hope you had a great weekend. Yesterday was definitely a soup day!
Posted by: mona at November 13, 2005 05:44 PM
Hi mona -- glad you like the blog. Today was a soup day, too -- I dragged D to Carnegie Deli and endured tourists talking about Broadway shows all around me just to get some matzoh ball soup.
Posted by: Cindy at November 14, 2005 08:20 PM
Just catching up on your latest entries (pre-move craziness, post-move lack of Internet connection). Is the Japanese noodle movie you mentioned possibly Tampopo? I love that movie! Makes me unbearably happy and hungry...
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092048/
Posted by: Lloyd at November 17, 2005 02:15 PM
Yes!! It is Tampopo. I only remembered bits and pieces. Guess I need to rent it and watch it again. I remember feeling the same way at the end -- happy and hungry specifically for that noodle soup. Great movie.
Posted by: Cindy at November 18, 2005 11:55 PM