If you generalize Japanese cuisine it is not spicy. The spicy dishes that they eat are generally imported from Korea or China and even then they aren’t spicy. I think I figured out why too.

The other day I went to this Ramen shop with my friend for lunch in 目黒 Meguro. We walk into this place and immediately it is different from the other ramen places I’ve seen or been to. People aren’t inhaling it. In fact they are eating quite slowly. I look on the walls – this place has been on TV before. There were screen captures of various celebrities eating their ramen on TV with おいしい〜 (delicious) written at the bottom.

They have 3 popular menu items: 4 star, 6 star, and 10 star ramen. Somebody reported seeing a 12 star ramen, but that doesn’t make any sense. Wanting to place it safe just incase the ramen was actually quite spicy I ordered the 6.

I saw the 10 come out that my friend ordered. I wish I had taken a photo, but it looked like it was solid red. I must say I had have never before seen a grown Korean man cry eating ramen. Mine arrived. Not too scary looking: just ramen with what appears to be a thick mabodofu on the top.

Boy was I wrong.

The ramen

Im not sure what was worse: the heat or the spice. My mouth hurt more from the heat but my neck was sweating from the spice. I understood why everybody was eating it so slowly. You physically cannot inhale this stuff like you can the regular salt or soy ramen.

I tried like hell to finish it all. I really did. It would just not physically fit. At least not in a decent timeframe. I managed to eat it all and drink about half of the soup. And still worried about indigestion – something I never worry about.

Me afterwords – trying not to pop.