New challenge: Ramen Dai Hongo

*External link to the Japanese website
**External link to the website except written in Japanese

After shopping at Akihabara, about 8:30 p.m. I went from there to Hongo, Bunkyo ward (文京区本郷) in order to visit Ramen Dai Hongo (らーめん大 本郷店) for the first time.
Ramen Dai is the largest shop chain of Jiro-inspired ramen, whose main branch is located in Horikiri, Katsushika ward (葛飾区堀切).
I have visited Higashi-Koganei and Horikiri of all its branches before.

It was raining gently. It was a bad condition for walking outside.
Moreover, I was in a sweat maybe because of high humidity.


Kanda Myojin shrine

Going along Hongo dori street (本郷通り) (National Route 17 [国道17号線]) by walk and passing by in front of Kanda Myoujin shrine (神田明神), about 8:45 p.m. I arrived at Dai, which is located near Hongo campus of the University of Tokyo (To-dai) (東京大学本郷キャンパス). Do in the hell Jirolians of To-dai students come to this shop?

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Outside of Dai Hongo

I was surprised at the fact there were no customers and staffs in the shop when I got there.
The master came out of a backyard.
He looked as old as or a little older than I.

At first I wanted to choose miso ramen (コク味噌らーめん) which is said on Ramen Datebase* to be served here but its ticket was not sold on a ticket machine.
I asked him why.
He answered, "Auh... Now we don't serve miso ramen."

F**kin' damn RDB!
It gave me an wrong information again!
(It is the fact that in the past miso ramen was served here [see here*])

Instead, after all I chose middle-sized ramen (らーめん中盛) (750 yen) as usual.


Middle-sized ramen

At first I did not expect that its ramen was good. I thought "inspired is inspired, not original."
But it tasted much better than I expected!
I like its very soft roast pork and oily soup.

I think that Dai Hongo is definitely better than Ramen Jiro Ikebukuro (ラーメン二郎 池袋店) or Kabuki-cho (同 歌舞伎町店) at least.
And I would rather visit Dai Hongo than visit Ramen Kojirou 526 Nippori (らーめんこじろう526 日暮里店) by walk between Akihabara and Nippori.
It is not untrue that Dai Hongo has No. 279 ranking on RDB, the second highest of all its branches as of Nov. 7. (Dai Warabi* [らーめん大 蕨店] has the highest, No. 276 ranking.)

By the way, the master looked a little silly and talked to me while he was cooking or I was eating therefore I was not able to concentrate on ramen.
(However, I answered his every question pleasantly; I do not dislike talking with staffs at a ramen shop.)

What he asked me:

• How far was the shop from Akihabara by walk?
• Would Kato Tomohiro (加藤智大), the amok-runner of Akihabara massacre** (秋葉原通り魔事件) be put to death? (I answered "maybe yes." By the way, I had gone to Akihabara about 7 p.m., Jun. 8, Sunday, 2008 when the incident happened there at noon.)
• How many passengers did Kato kill?
• Why did Kato become a killer? (I answered that ordinary persons like us could never understand the reason. Generally speaking, we could hate someone whom we have known well too much to kill him but we CANNOT hate someone we do not know at all.)
• Would Ichihashi Tatsuya (市橋達也), who murdered Lindsay Ann Hawker** (リンゼイ・アン・ホーカーさん殺人事件), be put to death? (I answered "probably no" because he killed only one person in Japan though he had been escaping for about 4 and a half years.)
  
• Does Ichihashi like European women who have blue eyes and blond hair? (Stupid question...)
• Aren't Japanese men popular with white women? (Stupid question again... According to him, he was seeking white [especially British] women who would make friends with him through Facebook though he could not speak and write in English! I told him about one of my friends who got married with a German woman who has blue eyes and blond hair. Popular person is popular, unpopular person is not popular.)
  

And when I finished eating, he asked me last, "my shop or Horikiri main shop, which is better?"
"Well... Your ramen is better than Horikiri, I think," I answered. In fact, as I stated before (but in Japanese!), I did not got the good impression on Horikiri.

After I left the shop, I went to Ueno (上野) by walk along Kasuga dori street (春日通り) through Yushima, Bunkyo ward (文京区湯島) in order to buy hayauri Weekly Shonen Jump (週刊少年ジャンプ).
And I went back to Yushima from Ueno in order to take Subway Chiyoda line (地下鉄千代田線). I got very tired walking.