Chuka Soba Charume (中華ソバちゃるめ): Old School Ramen, New School Twist; Kojiya, Tokyo

Out towards Haneda airport is a shop making a pretty big name for themselves as one of the pioneers in a trending ramen style taking over a lot of Tokyo ramen shops. What they serve is something that’s now being called Neo Classic Chuka Soba, a sort of new wave rendition of an old school classic style. Charume is one of the forerunners of this style in Tokyo churning out their beloved bowls out of their shop just five minutes from Kojiya station. The shop is closed on Mondays and open for lunch from 11-3 pm. Dinner service is available only on weekdays and is open from 18:00-21:00. They do close at times or Holidays so be sure to check their Twitter for updated opening hours.

So the menu is relatively simple, but unfortunately is displayed only in English so I’ll translate it for you below. Top row is their famous Chuka Soba which starts with the Tokusei (all toppings), Chuka Soba (as is), Ajitama Chuka Soba (with a soft boiled egg), and Wonton Chuka Soba (with wontons). Second row is the salt version of the first row buttons (along with the toppings) and the third row is the Maze Soba (soupless), Gentei (seasonal specialty), Chashu Chuka Soba (with extra pork chashu), and Chashu Shio Chuka Soba. For the first row of small buttons on the bottom is small rice, rice, small chashu over rice, chashu over rice, and a specialty rice. Below that in that green are the toppings starting with Ajitama soft boiled egg, seaweed, menma, wontons, and chashu. The row below that is small Asahi Superdry beer, medium Superdry, small Budweiser, oolong tea, large size noodles, and on the far right is appetizer chashu, and a 3 appetizer set. I ended up ordering the Wonton Chuka Soba (shoyu) with a side of chashu over rice.

What makes the ramen here Neo Classic Chuka Soba as opposed to the classic Chuka Soba is their use of refined ingredients for the bowl. Not to say the nostalgic, old school bowls are lower in quality, but they were originally prepared using whatever pork and chicken bones they can get their hands on. Well with Charume they use the highest quality pork and chicken for their stock and uses a hand select blend of soy sauces for their tare to make their incredibly decadent soup. Thankfully it doesn’t stop there as they also substitute the basic dried fish elements by using high end katsuobushi to bring three layers of elegant flavors. Finally the soup is finished with a generous ladle of shimmering Chiyu chicken oil to give the bowl a nice fatty component. Master here, Iwase-san, trained at perennial Tabelog Top 100 recipient Soranoiro so the techniques to prepare the bowl is top class as well so you know you’re in for a treat.

Noodles are brought in from popular manufacturer Nakano Seimen, but worked closely with Iwase-san to pair with their soup. They strands are straight, snappy, and have a fantastic texture to them making them very satisfying to slurp. Topping this Wonton version is a cut of rolled pork belly chashu, chicken chashu, komatsuna mustard greens, menma, naruto, wontons, and nori (dried seaweed). I’m a sucker for wontons, but I did find this to be a bit small for my liking. Would have liked a bit more substance, but flavor wise they were really well made. The menma provided a great crunch for a nice texture variety and the komatsuna brought some awesome earthy elements for a nice added layer of flavor. Chashu though were definitely the highlight and something very different from what you would find in a bowl of old school Chuka. The pork belly was tender, but still had enough structure to it that it didn’t melt in between my chopsticks (as you can probably tell from the photo). I loved the ratio of meatiness to decadent fat and capped off the toppings nicely.

In addition to the ramen, I also opted to grab their chashu over rice which I was very pleased with. I usually order a Tokusei, or ramen with all the extra toppings, but if I see a chashu over rice on the menu, I’ll skip on the extra chashu for the ramen. What I enjoyed was the fact that Charume uses a different cut of chashu for the rice bowl than the one served in the ramen. The variety was a pleasant surprise and I thought these meatier cuts paired better with the fluffy rice underneath. Sauce has a bit of ginger in it to give it a refreshing cut to the rich shoyu tare. Really well designed and something I will definitely order when I come back to try their Shio version of the ramen.

All in all, very well made ramen and excellent dining experience. I went on a weekday for lunch so it wasn’t too crowded, but I hear they do draw lines on weekends so plan carefully if you’re planning on visiting. However, the master and the server were both very friendly during my visit, explaining how to best enjoy my ramen when I was served, so definitely great for first timers dipping their feet in this trending ramen style so I would say the wait is worth it. A bit far from central Tokyo, but it is close to Kamata, a pretty interesting sub city within Tokyo so lots to explore after your meal as well so take the plunge and make a visit! If you do end up grabbing a bowl from Charume, let me know what you thought in the comment section below! Enjoy!