Minca aptly bills itself as "Ramen Factory," for other than a few standard appetizers, ramen is the only item on the menu. But so many kinds of ramen, served with a really impressive variety of fresh ingredients. Think flavorful mushrooms, great broth, tender pork, and noodles with firm spring and good bite. We inquired about this curious item, #10: "Sometimes, We have Experimental Ramen---Ask our staff." It seems that would be kimchi ramen, something we have yet to try. With flavorful gyoza in nearly paper-thin wrappers, Minca is worth a detour from the usual haunts on East Ninth and East Tenth Streets.
---NYC.com
The usual noodle-bar gimmicks are not part of the equation at Minca. You can’t mix and match your meat and broth. Instead, the gleaming East Village soup-stop stays focused on 15 simple items—all of them certainly better than anything you microwaved in college. Nab one of the few bar stools overlooking the stoves and dive into light homemade dumplings stuffed with panfried minced pork, followed by chashu ramen, a buttery broth stocked with egg, bamboo shoots and sheets of nori, topped with thin, tender slices of pork.
---Time Out New York
Read the article on New York Times
Here Comes Ramen, the Slurp Heard Round the World
by JULIA MOSKIN
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25 AND UNDER; East Village Noodles, All the Way From Japan
by ERIC ASIMOV
"I don't taste much garlic in this," said Amy. I stared at my friend in disbelief as we dug into our bowls of ramen at Minca. She said...what? The pork-based broth of our basic ramens was completely saturated with garlic, maybe so much that my friend's taste buds had been shocked out of its ability to taste garlic. But I could taste it fine. And it was delicious...
---serious eats New York
Like typical eight-person ramenyas in Japan, Minca is cramped, not air-conditioned, and has exposed brick walls and just a few tables. The best place to sit is at the long wooden bar facing the kitchen, so you can watch the chef cook. Ramen is Japan's most popular street food, so it's no surprise that lots of teenage Japanese expats frequent the place, along with suit-and-ties pausing for a quick after-work meal. Aside from a few Japanese beers, appetizers, and one rice dish, there's nothing but ramen on the menu—so it's a good thing it's done well. First, you choose from four types of broth; the best option is shoyu, chicken and soy sauce, which has a thick, meaty texture; the noodles are springy wheat chukasoba noodles. The best dishes combine chunks of pork or seafood with the noodles: Charshu ramen has two types of mushrooms and melting, buttery, thin slices of pork cooked in oil and garlic in front of you; seafood ramen contains generous pieces of shrimp, baby conch, squid, and bay scallops, which give the broth a tantalizingly briny taste. All ramen bowls are topped with scallions, black mushrooms, a sheet of nori seaweed, and tamago, half a hard-boiled egg cooked in soy sauce.
---New York Magazine by Timothy Cooper
MINCA 536 East Fifth Street New York, NY, 10009 Phone 212.505.8001
KAMBI 351 East 14th Street New York, NY, 10003 Phone 212.228.1366
