Sai (菜) has been the top spot for ramen in Ichikawa City (Chiba) since 2001. For such a small place, their ramen menu is vast – from miso ramen to tsukemen.
Finest Ramen in Ichikawa
Their signature shoyu ramen features a bold, dark shoyu (soy sauce). In the soup, there’s plenty of delicious stickiness from chicken bones.
Additionally, you’re treated to high-quality spinach, beautiful slow cooked chashu pork, and a special, extra rich Okukuji (Ibaraki area) half-boiled egg. Make sure to order the egg!
Their red miso ramen is all about a thicker, frothier broth. It’s naturally intensely flavored with that miso.
Besides the 2 above ramen, they have shio (salt), shiro (white) miso, mixed miso, koikuchi (concentrated) katuso or niboshi, shio katsuo or niboshi. A whole lot of choices.
In any of their ramen, they make the flat, slippery noodles in-house, via an 18 year old machine. You’ll see this noodle maker in the corner of this tiny shop.
Tsukemen Too!
With any the above seasoning choices, you can also order tsukemen (dipping ramen). Pictured below is the koikuchi niboshi (dried sardines) tsukemen.
In it, there are indeed pockets of niboshi flavor. But it doesn’t have an overall strong fish taste. Furthermore, it’s a relatively thin broth for tsukemen.
But it is concentrated in the sense that it’s a very salty shoyu broth. The pepper-seasoned chashu pork (like Marucho) in Ogikubo are equally salty.
The ramen and tsukemen at Sai straddle a fine line between classic and modern. The owner actually got his start in French cuisine.
All in all, for ramen in Ichikawa, you can’t go wrong with Sai. Their big menu will keep you coming back as well. Sai is closest to Onigoe and Moto-Yawata stations (Ichikawa City, Chiba).