Ippudo - restaurant review

Don't faff around with side dishes at Ippudo — go for a bolstering bowl of ramen and be off again, says Victoria Stewart
Eat and go at Ippudo: Akamaru Modern Ramen (Picture: Ming Tang-Evans)
© Ming Tang-Evans
Victoria Stewart4 December 2014

Following an Evening Standard-Google panel debate about the possibility of achieving “a tech-life balance” we bounce into a lively-looking new ramen restaurant approximately 15 metres from the tech giant in the sparkling St Giles Piazza development and I am asked for my number. Then a message arrives as we’re at the bar, saying: “Welcome to Ippudo London! You will be notified via text when your table is ready, so keep your phone handy.”

As it happens, we are notified by a real human so perhaps this place, currently a hotspot in New York and parts of Asia, needs to work harder on its own tech-life equilibrium.

Anyhow, it has another surprise under its apron. No sooner have we stood up but an excitable chorus of “Irrashaimase” (welcome, in Japanese) sparks up from every staff member. I half wonder if I’ve developed mysterious superpower status — that or we’re in the middle of a singing flash mob.

Surrounded by three colossal glass walls, Ippudo has an air of the goldfish bowl about it. Downstairs you can sit alongside an open kitchen (tip: avoid if you want to avoid ongoing welcome choruses), and the great glass steps that take you skywards are brimming with staff who beam A LOT.

A short, sharp menu first explains the Japanese concept of ramen: “a microcosmos in a bowl”, the basic broth for which “is derived from the essence of pork, chicken, beef or seafood, and seasoned with soy sauce, salt, miso and other important ingredients, etc”. Next a list of starters, salads, à la carte, bowls of ramen, which you can choose to have cooked yawa (soft), futsuu (normal) or kata-men (hard).

Zuke-Maguro at Ippudo (Picture: Ming Tang-Evans)
Ming Tang Evans

The drinks menu, meanwhile, is a monster. Not being seasoned sake drinkers we are advised to start light, choosing a sparkling one (£21) — all the rage dontchaknow — which comes with its own special pouring ritual. Light, sweet and chirpy, could it be the lovechild of prosecco and elderflower cordial?

As electro-swing bangs out from surround-sound speakers we can also see a chef, his face buried in vast, steaming cauldrons of ramen. A miniature plate of raw baby octopus with freshly chopped wasabi is leathery and odd, but kale salad with asparagus and cashew nuts delivers a plethora of textures and varying sweet, sour flavours. The sticky-bottomed chicken and veg gyoza dumplings are light but low on flavour, and one of my companions says sadly that his tofu and vegetable teppen, despite having had hot onion sauce poured over it causing an exciting sizzle, is “small and bit soggy”.

The ramen is the star of this place. Bowls arrive with beautifully presented pork/veg/noodle combos, plus separate china bowls with slurping spoons. My friend James adds a curry ball to his Akamaru Modern Ramen and it is an enjoyable broth — spicy, rich and full — cooked kata-men so that the noodles are slightly al dente. My Shiromaru Hakata Classic is exceptionally and gratifyingly rich — the noodles both dense, light and slithery, and not breaking under the weight of extra fatty pork.

To finish, Kurogoma Panna Cotta is like a speckled black sesame version served with teeny baubles of brilliant tart mango sorbet and a scrape of black sesame paste.

Ippudo London isn’t somewhere you want to waste time faffing over side dishes. Come for a bolstering bowl of ramen, wash it down with a mug of sake and be off again — and don’t forget to smile when the chorus starts up again as you leave.

3 Central St Giles Piazza, WC2 (020 7240 4469, ippudo.co.uk). Lunch 11am–3pm, dinner 5pm-10.30pm. £60 for three-course dinner for two with sake

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