Death by a Thousand Savory Sips: Minca Ramen, East Village, NYC

There is a time and temperature in which bodies will dictate needs.  And grossly precipitating February dictates that right-thinking peeps should drink deeply of salt and spicy pork.

The Effing BroBros answer the Ramen Siren song far more often than I do; I haven't their cravings or patience for Ippudo.

(Tangent: HOW strange is that place, that you have to endure being crammed into a slaughterhouse pen of a bar for an hour +, to finally be set loose in a ginormous circus tent of a ramen house?  My theory: The food is just okay, and it's just starvation-amplified gratitude for space that makes everything taste AMAZING!)

When the fancy does strike me, I prefer a nook or cranny that's a little steamy, laid-back, where the service is endearingly perfunctory.  And when I find myself shoved in the Alphabet reaches of the East Village, primed with hunger and a couple of cocktails, Minca's foggy windows winnow to the top of my sodium-consciousness.

I did invite the Effing BroBros to accompany me, but their answers were the same: Ooooh, that sounds good!  But I don't think my stomach can take it.

My reply to both: What?  It's just RAMEN!  Since when can you not handle ramen?

So 'twas with this brassy hubris that I perched on one of Minca's tall stools with Chocolate Bear, inches away from simmering stock and boiling baskets of stretchy-fresh ramen.

We shared an order of crisp-bottomed gyoza ($4.85):

Juicy, thin-skinned, loosely packed with veggies and pork (no lead-meatball dumplings here, thank you!) there is no more natural companion for Sapporo ($4.75)-- Greasy-savory/swallow, bitter-bubbly/swallow, repeat until depleted.

They held us over nicely until the main event--Chocolate Bear went for the Big Daddy pork broth item on the menu, the Toroniku Ramen ($14):

It may seem odd to some that there's raw vegetal matter sitting on top, but that cabbage = life raft in a sea of pork distillate.  The soup is viscous, just short of a thin gravy that veils the katame (al dente), wavy noodles and hunks of sweet-tender braised pork.  I'm fairly certain that if one were to set this bowl out on the cold sidewalk, it would turn into a bowl of piggy jello within minutes.

Being a sharper creature than myself, Chocolate Bear enjoyed his ramen, but didn't attempt to drain all of this mythical soup.  I, like a gluttonous moron, lapped up every bit of mine:

She was a thing of salty beauty, the Spicy Basic Ramen ($11); let's break it down, shall we?  Clockwise, starting at the pork at 6 o'clock, we've got:

• charsiu (shoyu-braised sliced pork)
• half a shoyu-braised egg
• shredded kombu (reconstituted cured kelp)
• nori (dried, pressed seaweed)
• menma (shoyu-braised bamboo shoots)
• chopped scallions

In a breath, it's land-animal-as-salt (embryonic and fully developed), sea-plants-as-salt (2 kinds), mountain-plant-as-salt.  And scallions.  Oh, and noodles, to soak up this devastating primordial RAINBOW of umami, winking red chili oil, and pork broth that was not quite so collagen-heavy as the Chocolate Bear's Toroniku, but still heavy enough where drinking the whole bowl is inadvisable.

...yet inevitable.  I couldn't stop myself, even though I could feel my insides being embalmed with serious savor and spice, fermented soy and pork fat.  Phuck pearl cream--the Japanese secret to dewy youth is that they're positively lined with salt on an atomic level. 

And faster than you can utter "what's-your-problem-you-wuss-it's-just-ramen", my happy soup-noodle glow faded into a rapid succession of garlic burps and sodium-bloat.  (I'm sure I was LOVELY company post-Minca--sorry, Chocolate Bear.)

Lesson learned; heed the stomachs and warnings of one's younger siblings.  Space monsters and cannibals, Godzilla was onto something: Japanese people and all those who favor the regular consumption of real ramen are bound to be the be the tastiest of us all.

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Minca
536 E 5th St
(Btwn Ave A & Ave B)
East Village
NYC, NY 10009

Daily: 12:30pm-11:30pm

Extras: Handy-dandy glossary of ramen terms, and the Frugal Traveler's ramen tryst in Japan (so very, very jealous).

Comments

[Chocolate Bear]

Food so good...it puts one to sleep

[from b e h i n d]

Nice choices, both bowls look amazing!

When ya making some, EF? With more pork chops (or cutlet). And some "golden" curry...

Any case, let me know the next time you intend to get all kaiju on that place ;)

[EF]

you're on!  but only if you promise to take the sippy spoon away from me when the soup horizon falls below half (and it will. because i'm a salty-monkey-MORON.)