Yokosuka Tanmen Dobuita Street

Rating: Very good
Meal: Lunch
Price:  900 yen
Payment: Cash only
Dishes:Yokosuka Tanmen
English Menu:No
Smoking:Yes

Update 6/24/2016 - I was walking down the alley the other day and noticed that it appears this restaurant is now closed, which is sad because I liked it and never got to bring anyone else.  Oh well...that's two restaurants in this spot that have opened and closed in the past year.

*****

Yokosuka Tanmen Dobuita Street (I double checked on the name) recently opened in place of the short-lived India Village restaurant, and it is definitely an improvement.  Apparently, Tanmen is a type of Ramen...though not one I had heard of before.  This little restaurant has a very simple menu...there is one kind of tanmen available and gyoza.  You can get a side of rice too if you want.  Or beer, oolong tea chuhi or just oolong tea.

Local Yokosuka vegetables

I ordered the one option and was given a little bowl of "yokosuka vegetables."  The leafy thing was very curious...I had never seen it before.  It was a little bit...softly crunchy?  I'm not sure how to describe it.  All tasty though.

The tanmen itself was a pretty big bowl, covered with a mound of vegetables.  In my limited perusal of the Japanese signs in the restaurant, it appears that they take great pride in the excellence of their ingredients, perhaps trying to local source all the vegetables.  The rice is a special strain that comes from a particular location too.

How was it?  Pretty good I'd say...I do like me some vegetables.  The closest style to it I've had before would be champon (Ringerhut does champon...it's a Nagasaki style), but the broth is a bit thinner.  Also, it wasn't very salty as ramen usually is, so I added some condiments.  There were some bits of pork in there too, but thin pieces and not fatty.  I think my wife would really like it, and I enjoyed it as a much lighter bowl of ramen.  I was able to drink it to the dregs without feeling like I had a bowling ball in my stomach and was going to die of salt poisoning!

So yeah, I'm looking forward to bringing my wife back here and maybe some friends from base.