Shirunashi Tantanmen Kisaku

One of Hiroshima’s local delicacies is “soupless tantanmen,” but it was not that long ago, in 2002, that this soupless tantanmen first appeared in Hiroshima. In fact, soupless tantanmen seems to be a common dish in Sichuan Province, China, and one ramen shop in the city adopted it and began selling it as Hiroshima B-Grade (casual) Gourmet Shirunashi Tantanmen (soup-less dandan noodles). It is by no means a Hiroshima original gourmet dish.

Even so, if you like B-Grade gourmet food, you should try it at least once in Hiroshima, along with okonomiyaki, and when I looked it up, I found that it originated at a restaurant called Shirunashi Tantanmen Kisaku, located a little far from downtown Hiroshima. So, let’s go there! So, when I went to Hiroshima on business the other day, I went straight from Hiroshima Station to the restaurant…

The restaurant is one of the highest level of “Kitana Shuran” type restaurants I have ever visited…Shirunashi Tantanmen Kisaku is a restaurant like this!

When I actually stood in front of Shirunashi Tantanmen Kisaku at around 11:30 on a certain Friday, the atmosphere was, contrary to my expectations, quite subdued. As the birthplace of a local delicacy that Hiroshima should be proud of, I expected to see a long line of people waiting in front of the restaurant before noon. I was so surprised to find the place so quiet that I wondered, “Is it closed temporarily today? I knew that the restaurant was open for business because a customer came out after eating just after I arrived….

When I entered the restaurant, I found it to be another nice kitanasuran… The restaurant is dimly lit, but I think it is one of the highest level restaurants I have ever eaten at. The seating capacity is 15 at an L-shaped counter along the kitchen. The kitchen inside is relatively spacious. The service was a little blunt. The service is a little blunt, so you may feel a little intimidated if you are a woman alone at first.

This is the prototype! What was it like to try the soup-less tantanmen at Kisaku, the birthplace of Hiroshima’s famous B-class gourmet, soup-less tantanmen?

Let’s put that aside and place your order first. There is a ticket machine on the left side of the entrance, where you purchase a meal ticket…

As you can see on the ticket machine, the menu of Shirunashi Tantanmen Kisaku can be roughly divided into…

• Shirunashi Tantanmen
• Chilled Shirushi-Shirunashi Tantanmen
• Pintan noodles

There are three types of soup-less tanmen, cold soup-less tanmen, and pin tan noodles. The last one, “pin” means “cold” in Chinese, and it is said to be a soup-less tantanmen with cold noodles. However, it seems that pintan noodles are “noodles that are cold but the sauce is warm,” which distinguishes them from “cold soup-less danmen” in which both noodles and sauce are cold. It is a bit confusing… Am I the only one who thinks that if the contents are the same, it would be easier to understand if the name was “shirunashi tantanmen” and the noodles were distinguished by being hot, cold etc., like Sanuki udon noodles?

What I ordered this time at Kisaku was a large bowl of shirunashi tantanmen with warm noodles and sauce (price: 650 yen including tax). You can customize the spiciness in six levels: 0, 1/4, 1/2, normal, spicy, and very spicy, and I ordered it at normal spiciness this time.

After about 10 minutes of waiting, a bowl of soupless tantanmen arrived in front of me. The thin noodles are topped with two simple toppings: minced meat and chopped green onions.

Now, following the directions on how to eat it, stir the noodles more than 30 times to thoroughly blend the sauce throughout…but it is hard to stir because the noodles are sticking to each other. I patiently stirred for a few minutes while loosening the noodles with chopsticks…

This is the finished product. Now, let’s eat it right away… Contrary to its mild appearance, it has a very stimulating taste. The spiciness of the chili oil and the numbness of the pepper. The numbness is particularly strong, and it tingles from the lips to the tongue. If you don’t like spicy food, you really need to be careful. You may think, “It’s just spicy, but it doesn’t taste very good.” But in fact, the sauce, which is based on soy sauce with a hint of seafood flavor, has a very well integrated taste.

The aroma of the pepper wafting from my mouth to my nose is pleasant, and the noodles are thin, so they are easy to eat. I was sweating on my forehead, but I ate it in no time at all. It was a strange food that made me want to eat it again after a while. By the way, according to Wikipedia, the authentic tantanmen eaten in Sichuan Province is the original “soup-less” type. When we Japanese hear the word “tantanmen”, we imagine “soup with noodles”, but it seems that this type of noodle is arranged for the Japanese. As Wikipedia says, Kisaku’s soup-less tantanmen may be good to eat as a light meal. However, it is so high level as a “Kitana-Shuran” type, that I think, “Can’t they do something more about it?”

For those who don’t like the atmosphere of the restaurant, takeout is recommended… Access to Shirunashi Tantanmen Kisaku is a one-minute walk from the nearest station, Funairi-Saiwaicho Station on the Hiroshima Electric Railway Line.1分

Shirunashi Tantanmen Kisaku also offers take-out. Prices are the same as for eat-in, and you order by purchasing a meal ticket from the ticket vending machine. Basically, I am skeptical about taking out ramen noodles (because the noodles might get soggy during the take-out process), but it seems that there is no need to worry about the noodles getting soggy if they are soupless, and if you don’t like the atmosphere of the restaurant, you can try the soupless tantanmen as take-out. Although it requires a bit of travel from the city center, it is also recommended to take it back to your hotel as a snack when you are on a business trip to Hiroshima.

Here are the details of the restaurant…