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If you’re planning on visiting the Ichiran ramen chain on your trip to Japan, it’s good to have an idea of how their unique ordering system works so you can breeze through it like a local. Let us explain…
Ichiran is a chain of ramen restaurants that has developed a reputation for amazing ramen. One of the reasons for this is that they offer the chance to customize your bowl exactly how you like it – you pick how you like your noodles, what toppings you want and whether you’d like things spicy or not.
The other USP of Ichiran is minimal interaction with staff and other customers. Not surprisingly, you, therefore, order your meal from a ticket machine.
This alone might be intimidating enough, but, when you arrive at Ichiran to find a vending machine like the one below, that doesn’t have 500 options on it, you might be even more confused.
Where’s the customising? Let us explain…
The Quick Guide to Ordering at Ichiran
Here’s what will happen… first head in, find the machine and, push the button that turns it into English. This makes everything much easier!
1. Pick Your Ramen
The first step is to choose the bowl of ramen you want.
The Ichiran 5 is the most popular dish, and this comes with five different toppings included. Seaweed, pork, mushrooms, onions and a boiled egg (it’s large).
If you don’t feel like all the bells and whistles, the Classic Tonkatsu ramen comes just with some pork and green onions. This is the one that I chose as I don’t really like boiled eggs.
All the bowls come with Ichiran’s famous red sauce which you can customise to its spice level.
If you want a happy medium, order the Classic, but then add extra servings of other toppings like seaweed, egg, or a larger serving of pork or noodles, with the buttons on the machine.
If you’re really hungry you can also add a side dish of rice, and you also get the chance to order a drink and dessert.
Put your money in before you order. Press the button to get the change when you finish. You can also pay by credit card or a loaded IC Card like Suica.
Take your tickets from the machine – now go and find somewhere to sit.
2. Find Your Seat
The seats at Ichiran are mostly these solo style booths. They have wooden panelling on either side so you don’t really see your neighbours and, when you arrive the wooden curtain will be pulled down in front of the serving hatch.
As you can see, Ichiran isn’t really a place to go with a large group as you won’t be able to sit together, and it’s usually very quiet, so there’s no shouting across the booths either.
The idea is that you just focus on the taste of the ramen with as few distractions as possible.
If the branch is large, there’s usually a staff member directing you to the area with free seating or, in some Ichiran branches, you pick your seat before entering the restaurant. Look for a machine with green or blue lights on it. The lit up seats are empty, so pick the ones you’d like and head to them.
3. Start Customizing
When you get to your table, it’s time for the fun bit – you start customizing your ramen. You’ll find an order form and a pencil on your table.
You’ll be asked things like how much onion, garlic, or chilli you want. Do you want a rich sauce or a thinner one? do you want hard noodles or soft ones? Do you want the pork or onions or have it served without? Just circle your answer – if you’re not sure the ‘suggested’ version is circled already.
If at this point, you realize you’ve forgotten something you want in your bowl, like extra seaweed or more noodles, or, decide you actually do want a drink with your meal, you can add this now too. There’s a list on the back – but you will have to pay the extra in cash.
As you can see, all of this is handily in English as well as Japanese
4. Ordering and Waiting For Your Meal
Once you’ve decided, push the bell on your table and you hand your order ticket and the paper to the serving staff – but they won’t come to your booth, they’ll lift the curtain in front of you and just pick up the ticket.
I still don’t know if the person serving me was male, female or a bear (which, if you visit the bear paw cafe in Harajuku will make perfect sense) as I literally saw their hands.
If you need to order anything else once you’ve sat down, push the call button, and the staff will help you. You’ll need to pay cash for anything extra you order.
If at any point you get confused, there’s also this handy wooden sign that you can show the staff.
And if you need the bathroom, or have to step outside to use your phone or something, you can save your seat – and let the staff know that you’re coming back to enjoy your tasty bowl of ramen – with this handy sign.
5. Enjoy Your Ramen
Ichiran serves a type of creamy ramen called tonkatsu ramen. This has a pork-based broth, and while they used to offer a non-pork version, this no longer exists – nor do they cater for vegetarians.
I just chose all the suggested settings with mine, except for the spicy sauce which I bumped up to medium.
It was pretty good. I like tonkatsu ramen, so I enjoyed the rich, creamy taste, although the broth was thinner than I had expected. I think next time I’d increase the richness level to ‘rich’ to make up for that.
I have a high tolerance for spice, and I could have gone harder on the red sauce. The other thing I wished I’d added was seaweed. I didn’t realise that it was one of the things I really like in ramen until I had this bowl without it.
The portion size was pretty good. I was lining my stomach before I went to the Samurai Show in Kabukicho nearby, and it kept me full until late that evening.
Admittedly, it’s not a taste I’m dreaming about weeks afterwards (unlike the ramen I had at Thank! in Daimon) and, if you order the Ichiran 5 it is a lot more expensive than most bowls of ramen, but, I liked the quietness of the surroundings and the fact that it is so easy to order.
If you’re having one of those days when you just can’t Japan, it does make a good choice – except for one thing. It’s very, very popular.
The Secret to Beating the Queues at Ichiran
Queues for Ichiran can be incredibly long. The good news is that the solo dining experience means people don’t really clog up tables for long so things do move quickly,.
If you don’t want to waste time queuing, try to choose branches away from the main streets (a full list of them is here) and go outside main meal times. The branch I went to was in Shinjuku, and I arrived at about 2 pm and walked straight in.
To really beat the queues, though, have it for breakfast – many Ichiran branches are open 24 hours, and if you head down there at 9 am, there will be very few people in front of you.
It might sound strange, but it’s a great way to fuel you up for the day – and tick off the experience. That’s why it’s our guide to the top things to do in Tokyo in the morning.
So, there you have it; our guide to ordering at Ichiran, hopefully it will make things easier for you if you want to visit on your trip.
If you’re planning to go to other ramen shops in Japan or eat at any other kind of budget restaurant you might need to order from their ticket machine too. Unlike Ichiran, they might not have an English option, so read our guide on ordering from a ramen ticket machine to see what to do in that case.