Sukiya serves up a unique interpretation of miso ramen.

Along with Yoshinoya and Matsuya, Sukiya is one of Japan’s big-three gyudon/beef bowl chains. But while Sukiya has always been a great place to grab a bowl of beef over rice, as of this month it’s also a place where you can get ramen…kind of.

At the start of June, Sukiya added three different ramen options to its menu, and sure enough, when we paid a visit to our local branch we found them on the touch-screen order panel.

The らーめん part of the Japanese text is “ramen,” and if we expand our view to include みそ we can see that all three of Sukiya’s ramen options are “miso ramen.”

But just as important is the とん汁 part of the text, which indicates that these are all tonjiru. Tonjiru literally translates as “pork soup,” and it refers to a kind of extra-hearty miso soup with strips of pork and vegetables.

▼ Sukiya’s regular tonjiru

Now, while you could say that ramen is a kind of soup, on account of it having broth, miso ramen broth isn’t the same as the broth used for miso soup and tonjiru. Miso ramen broth tends to have a thicker consistency and heavier flavors, often with soy sauce, ginger, or garlic mixed in. The broth for miso soup and tonjiru, on the other hand, tends to be lighter, with dashi (bonito stock) also a key ingredient.

In other words, miso ramen isn’t made by adding ramen noodles to miso soup…except, apparently, at Sukiya.

Still, we’d come all the way here, and so we were going to try this unique hybrid of miso soup and miso ramen. We opted for Sukiya’s basic Tonjiru Miso Ramen for 360 yen (US$2.30), but they also have a Beef Tonjiru Miso Ramen and Spicy Green Onion Tonjiru Miso Ramen for 500 and 460 yen, respectively.

As we’d expected, when we took a taste we were greeted with different sensations that what you’d get from a bowl of orthodox miso ramen. And yet, Sukiya’s tonjiru miso ramen is delicious in its own unique way! The miso soup broth works surprisingly well with the ramen noodles, and the veggies give us some healthy and enticing complexity in the flavor profile and texture.

With the added noodles, Sukiya’s tonjiru miso ramen ends up being more filling than ordinary tonjiru, and it’s still a lighter meal than orthodox miso ramen. As a matter of fact, it might work best as a side dish, and you can actually get the tonjiru miso ramen as a set with a beef bowl for prices starting at 850 yen.

Sukiya says that its ramen will only be available for a limited time, but if it turns out to be a hit with customers, promoting it to permanent menu status seems like it’d be an easy thing to do, since they serve tonjiru all year round.

Tonjiru image: Sukiya
All other photos ©SoraNews24
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