Ramen Momonoya / らぁ麺桃の屋 - Odawara
Ramen Momonoya (らぁ麺桃の屋) is a ramen shop run by an all female team in Odawara. It opened in August of 2019 and is therefore one of the newer additions to the ramen scene in Odawara. Female owned ramen shops are still a rarity in Japan, so it’s always interesting to see what’s different to the other ramen shops out there. And with Momonoya, I think the female touch is hard to not see. The atmosphere and menu feels like it is catering to a more female audience. Or maybe the owner created a ramen shop and menu that they personally would enjoy. It fits well that the staff were incredibly friendly and open to have a short chat after my meal.
The front of Ramen Momonoya in Odawara.
The menu highlights their two main ramen dishes, which are a shio ramen and a shoyu ramen, both seem to use the same broth. The broth is made of a base of chicken and niboshi, as well as the pork chashu, which is boiled in the broth until tender. The result is a light and yet fragrant and delicate soup that doesn’t drag you down as much and leaves space for some of the interesting side dishes that are offered.
The full menu of Ramen Momonoya in Odawara, which includes two types of ramen and many side dishes, including desserts.
Written on the menu, you can find some more explanations for their menu items. For example, the shio ramen is apparently made with salt from Vietnam and the shoyu ramen includes ingredients from Bali.
The assari shio ajitama ramen at Ramen Momonoya.
I got their regular shio ramen, which comes are with a wide array of toppings, even before adding any additional toppings. The two different types of chashu were flanked by a quite big chicken mince meatball that has some cartilage worked into it as well. The cartilage provides a nice crunch, but can be offputting for people who aren’t used to it.
A ball made of minced chicken meat and chicken cartilage. Tender and crunchy at the same time!
The egg was also executed quite well. At Momonoya they seem to go for a more freshly soft boiled type of egg, which doesn’t have a cured yolk, but rather a runny yolk that oozes out when opened.
The soft boiled ajitama egg, very much on the soft boiled side of things.
The noodles are on the very thin side and fit quite well to overall balance of the mild and mellow nature of this bowl of ramen. They almost reminded me of Western wedding soup style noodles.
Thin ramen noodles, almost like angle hair soup pasta. Fits perfect to the light soup.
From what I can read online, it seems to be a good idea to order their mini curry as a side dish, which can be included in a lunch set for very little money. From I understand, they use their broth as the base for their curry, which gives it a more deep and round flavor compared to other curry that is just made with water. If I ever find myself here again without a plan to eat more bowls that day, you can be sure that I will add the curry to my order.
While there are quite a few options to pick from in and around Odawara in terms of ramen, I can safely recommend Ramen Momonoya as a great Ramen spot in Odawara that is worth checking out. And not only because it is one of the few female run ramen shops in Japan!
More information about Ramen Momonoya (らぁ麺桃の屋):
