Ramen Ishida Chelsea
Yohei Ishida cooked at Ippudo before he opened his own shop in 2017, built on a clear chicken broth. This is his second room, thirty-five seats bigger than the Ludlow Street original. It came out of a partnership with Kosaka.
Why go
Ishida uses Bobo chicken, an old hen with enough fat in her to make a clear soup taste rich. He ages his tare more than a week. The soy sauce arrives carrying mushroom and seaweed umami on top of the salt.2 The signature bowl puts truffle and porcini on top of that. The shop named it for the New York flourish. This room also runs a wider izakaya list than Ludlow does, with takoyaki and karaage rice bowls on it.1
Order this / avoid
- Order: the New Tokyo Style shoyu. It ran $19 on the shop's menu, and the clear broth is the thing you came to test.
- Avoid: reading the Ludlow write-up as a judgment on this room. That review is of a cramped eight-seater and this is the roomy one.
What locals & experts say
- The Infatuation, 24 October 2024, on this door: the publication records a second location opened in partnership with Kosaka, and is honest about its limits:
We haven't been here yet, but want you to know this spot exists.
1 - Yohei Ishida, on his own shop: he set out to introduce New Yorkers to his hometown Tokyo-style ramen on a clear chicken broth, and hopes
to debunk the perception that clear broth is less flavorful than a tonkotsu (white pork) broth.
2
Good to know
- Doors: two. The 2017 original is 122 Ludlow Street on the Lower East Side. This page is 104 Eighth Avenue.
- Booking: worth doing, and easier to skip here than at the original.
Verdict
could-visit — Come for a table and order the shoyu. The vegan bowl runs on a stock of ten dried vegetables with konbu and shiitake, and it costs what the chicken costs. Order one alongside if there are two of you.