A note on the words: tsukemen is ramen served with the noodles and dipping broth in separate bowls; in the konbu-water style the noodles arrive resting in a viscous kelp dashi so they taste of the sea before they ever meet the sauce. Katsuobushi is shaved dried bonito. Prices are as of this writing (August 2026).
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Menan Ibushi on Tabelog (English) — opening hours, payment details and the Japanese address are kept up to date there, not here.
Drinkers, thank you for waiting. It is Hangover Meshi time.
This time, Ikebukuro. Errands done, lunch beckoned… but the town was as absurdly crowded as ever and my usual targets were out of reach. So — walk-in roulette it is! I ducked into a place a little away from Ikebukuro Station, on the far side of Route 435.
Inside, buy a ticket from the machine. Free-range chicken konbu-water tsukemen (1,300 yen), or free-range chicken ramen (1,100 yen). The konbu-water tsukemen sat at the top of the board, so that decided it!
While waiting for the food, I looked around and spotted a poster: “Menan Ibushi’s recommended way to eat the konbu-water tsukemen!”
- First, a mouthful of the noodles alone.
Notice the aroma of the wheat, the smooth texture, and the flavour of the katsuo and konbu dashi. - Next, try a light dab of the table salt.
- The dipping sauce is made deliberately strong at the start.
Adjust how deeply you dip the noodles to taste. - Squeeze the lime if you like, and enjoy how the flavour changes.
- Enjoy, too, how the temperature and taste of the dipping sauce shift as time passes.
- * If you want to feel the body and edge of the soy sauce through to the end, you can also take noodles and sauce into your mouth separately and let them meet there. This is only one example — please enjoy the bowl in whatever style you like.
Very well — we shall eat exactly by the book!
First the condiments arrive — and right behind them, the noodles!
Ta-dah!
Look at that — the noodles are bathing in konbu water!!!
Right then — let us work through the recommended method!
First, mix the noodles well and try them alone. Medium-thin straight noodles from Mikawaya Seimen (the box was sitting in plain view!), high water content, slick and springy. Coated in the viscous konbu water, they leave the sweetness of the wheat and the katsuo-and-konbu dashi lingering on the tongue. Honestly, you could eat them just like this!
A pinch of salt. The wheatiness of the noodles jumps forward, and the outline of the dashi seems to sharpen.
A sip of the dipping sauce: a dense soy hits first, then the sweetness of chicken oil and the savour of free-range chicken come rolling in. The shop’s notes say they use a rare bottom-drawn tamari soy sauce — concentrated, deep, thick with umami. Dip the noodles and the weight of the soy and the sweetness of the wheat come into harmony!
A small squeeze of lime over the noodles, and the acidity flips the whole flavour bright and fresh.
From there it is condiments and more — plenty of ways to keep varying each mouthful!
And before I knew it, the bowl was empty. The portion was generous enough that I had doubts — unfounded!
So that was “Menan Ibushi”, wandered into on a whim. What a good shop. Konbu-water ramen keeps popping up here and there lately — and truly, these noodles are delicious even without the dipping sauce. If they offered a quarter-portion “konbu-water dressed noodles” I would be delighted^^
They seem to run limited-edition bowls at times too. I shall peek in again.
May you meet something good to eat today too.
Menan Ibushi (ramen / Ikebukuro Station, Higashi-Ikebukuro Station, Mukohara Station)
Tabelog lunch rating ★★★☆☆ 3.6
I ate here and paid for it myself. Nothing on this site is a comped meal.
One more for the road?
