Hakata, a fun and beautiful city in Kyushu, Fukuoka prefecture. If you have not been, I highly recommend going. I went to Kyushu a few years ago and stayed in Hakata for three nights. One thing I will never forget is, night time at the famous Naka River. There are so many tonkotsu ramen stalls along the river that it is a sight to behold. All those stalls serving delicious Hakata style tonkotsu ramen really takes me back. I was talking to my wife about my memory and mentioned that I wished we could have some good Hakata ramen. She then replied with, "let's go to Tsukuba."
Daruma Ikka
We drove to Kenkyugakuen station in Tsukuba that night and had to go around the the right side of some building. We found a ramen restaurant with a red sign that seemed to serve spicy ramen. I made a mental note to try that place later, and then we found Daruma Ikka. A small ramen restaurant with a yellow sign that promised delicious tonkotsu ramen.
I should mention that this is a chain restaurant and it is not originally from Ibaraki. It is Hakata style tonkotsu ramen, so yeah, it wouldn't be an Ibaraki original.
Inside
When you walk inside Daruma Ikka, you will notice that the restaurant's lay out is very simple and that it is a bit of a tight squeeze. I believe 10 people can fit on the restaurant, max. One cool thing was there were Daruma dolls around the restaurant. I should have expected that, the place is called Daruma Ikka.
The Menu
This is a tonkotsu place so the menu is going to be all tonkotsu ramen. The main ramen at this place is the Daruma ramen which is the ramen all the way to the right. Above that is the Black Daruma Ramen, and below that is the Red Daruma Ramen. Next to the Black Daruma Ramen is the Toku Daruma Ramen. Finally, you got the Oya Daruma Ramen.
Grab Your Ticket
This being a ramen place, of course there would be a ticket vending machine. The top yellow buttons are all the ramens I mentioned. Daruma, Black, Red, Toku and Oya. The right red button is for an extra egg, next to that is the lunch set button. The white buttons are all for rice and rice bowls. The orange buttons are for toppings. It just says toppings so I guess you tell the ramen chef what you want. The blue buttons are drinks. The green buttons are for small snacks with your beer. Finally, the last yellow button is for kids sized ramen. That night, my wife ordered the regular Daruma Ramen and I got the Oya Ramen.
Daruma Ramen
My wife's ramen came out first. It looked like a simple everyday tonkotsu ramen. It had the thin noodles that most tonkotsu ramen has, an egg and chashu. My wife let me get a taste and I liked it. The broth was a bit creamy which was kind of weird for a tonkotsu ramen. It didn't have that heavy ramen broth taste but it was also a little too light. The noodles went perfectly with that broth and the chashu was great. This did remind of my time in Kyushuu.
Oya Daruma Ramen
Leave it to me to order the special ramen. My ramen was pretty huge. It brought four pieces of chashu, an egg, a lot of bamboo shoots and that delicious tonkotsu broth I love. The broth was delicious, a little bit salty but delicious none the less. What was really different were the noodles.
So Thick
As I said earlier, tonkotsu ramen usually has really thin noodles, not my ramen. This tonkotsu ramen brought thick noodles which were quite different. Did I enjoy it? Yes. Does it go with tonkotsu ramen? No, I don't think so. The thin noodles usually help trap some of the broth between the noodles which make them delicious. The thicker noodles kind of just tasted like noodles without any broth. I did enjoy my ramen, but I am going to stick to my thinner noodles from now on.
I was so happy to have had tonkotsu ramen that night. It had been a while and just being able to have a delicious bowl of that ramen and relive my memories really made my night. My wife was happy with her ramen and wants to try it in Hakata as soon as possible.
So if you are near Kenkyugakuen station in Tsukuba and have a craving for some tonkotsu ramen, why not give Daruma Ikka a shot. Who knows, you might see me there, enjoying a bowl while thinking about Kyushuu.
Enjoy!
For more information on Daruma Ikka, check out their Instagram page:
One More Thing
A buddy of mine released an e-book about his top 100 places in Japan. He is an excellent writer and I love a lot of the places he mentions in the book. If you really want to know about certain places in Japan that are not on your high priced tour book, check it out.
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