Going organic in a ramen house, anyone? For a number of people when the word ramen is mentioned, the image of steaming bowls of noodles filled with a fat-laden meat soup base comes into mind. This doesn’t have to be the case all the time. One such ramen place along Denman Street breaks the tradition. It’s a place health-conscious food junkies would want to sit down to have a bite to eat. It’s a place where healthy eating can be a delectable alternative.

Ramen Quest – the search for Vancouver’s hidden Japanese Ramen.

You can download the this week’s PDF format HERE (or grab the full newspaper HERE,) or just keep reading (the unrated version) below.

Episode 6– Pièce de résistance

Image cutline: The Spicy Miso Ramen at MotomachiShokudo starts off with an innocuous chicken soup base and is built to perfection with two distinct miso pastes, loads of vegetables and a more delicate noodle than what you’d expect at other ramen shops.

A hand-scrawled note recently landed on my desk indicating that I was to then meet an unnamed informant at a relatively new ramen shop on Denman Street. A new Ramen Quest feature, I thought, and I was up to the challenge!

I started to do my research and my stomach dropped – queries that came to mind included, “what type of madman opens up a restaurant in direct competition half a block away from his original restaurant?” I’m sure that there were answers if the questions were to be phrased correctly, but then if I failed to be unentertaining, perhaps in this situation, it would be curtains for me. I decided to get my affairs in order and inform friends and family of my plans.

Fast forward to entering the place, I was greeted by two relatively sharp looking secret agent types dressed completely in black including black berets. I’m thinking to myself, uh oh – MI6 or Mossad or hired assassins?! Thankfully, they were brandishing gyoza, not guns and I was immediately put at ease when they showed me to a well-lit table in the center of the restaurant. Seated there was a man known only as Taku-san and it became immediately clear that he was willing to answer any question I put forth.

As we chatted, I learned that although Motomachi Shokudo and sister restaurant Kintaro share some ingredients from time to time, Taku-san’s people pride themselves on serving up ramen with a smooth chicken soup base composed of mostly organic ingredients. The original Tokyo-style ramen, he proclaimed. It’s lighter than and not as rich as the popular pork soup based ramen that are de rigeur at other shops.

Upon concluding our discussion, the meal they served to me was something else – Butchigiri Gyoza which was a winner by a long shot and the Spicy (Kara) Miso Ramen served with a ton of vegetables for good health which proved to be the pièce de résistance. With fond memories of this meal and other previous quests, I thought to myself, “another meal enjoyed – another quest done, and so far no price on my head. A good day indeed.”

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Raj Taneja is part technologist, part entrepreneur, part social media juggernaut and part foodie. He runs urbanmixer.com, publishes a miscellany of his musings at raj.jp and can be found on twitter with the username ‘tinhead.’