Latest news with #Tsujita
San Francisco Chronicle
04-07-2025
- Business
- San Francisco Chronicle
S.F. pastry pioneer arrives, plus more Peninsula and South Bay openings
The Peninsula and South Bay continue to draw some of the most diverse restaurants in the Bay Area. New openings in June range from fine-dining destinations to businesses that specialize in Uyghur, Indian and Thai regional fare. An underrepresented subgenre of ramen? It's here, now. The Peninsula gets elegant pastries Popular bakery Craftsman & Wolves has added its first brick-and-mortar location outside of San Francisco. The sleek new Mountain View bakery is stocked with Craftsman & Wolves's elegant cakes and creative pastries, such as the famed 'rebel within,' a savory muffin with an oozing soft-boiled egg hidden inside. New items only available in Mountain View include a savory kouign amann made with the flavors of a Philly cheesesteak and a sweet choux bun filled with vanilla crème fraîche, whipped ganache and guava-kalamansi jam. It opened soon after the death of founder Lawrence Lai in late April. Yeobo, Darling, is chefs Meichih and Michael Kim's third and most personal restaurant yet. Newly open in Menlo Park, it's an expression of Asian American identity, connecting their Korean and Taiwanese heritages with their training in the country's top fine dining restaurants. There's 48-hour marinated kalbi with seasonal banchan and Taiwanese staple lu rou fan, braised pork over rice, served in cheesy lasagna form. The Kims are known best for Maum, an acclaimed Korean tasting menu restaurant in Palo Alto that won a Michelin star before closing due to the pandemic. 827 Santa Cruz Ave., Menlo Park. L.A. ramen royalty arrives People are lining up at Tsujita, a ramen hit from Los Angeles that just opened in San Jose. It's devoted to tsukemen, bowls of thick, chewy ramen noodles served with an umami-rich, warm dipping broth on the side. Chronicle associate restaurant critic Cesar Hernandez praised the 'potent' sauce, as well as Tsujita's tonkotsu ramen. A Jewish deli for the Peninsula After the team behind Cal-Italian favorite Che Fico closed their Italian market in Menlo Park, they quickly replaced it with Bubbelah, a Jewish-inspired fast-casual restaurant. Che Fico's menu has long featured dishes influenced by Jewish cuisine from Rome, honoring co-owner David Nayfeld's heritage; Bubbelah advances that theme of Jewish diasporic cooking. The menu includes everything from house-made pita bread with dips like baba ghanoush to chopped chicken liver and spring onion latkes. Bubbelah is currently open for takeout and delivery only. An influx of Uyghur food? The Bay Area lost most of its Uyghur restaurants to the pandemic, but the cuisine is starting to see a resurgence. The latest Uyghur restaurant to open is Kusan Bazaar in Mountain View, whose owners operate two other South Bay spots that specialize in the cuisine. Expect dishes like grilled lamb kabobs, chewy laghman noodles and beef noodle soup. Kusan Bazaar also joins Mrs Khan Uyghur Cuisine in Menlo Park, a Top 100 Restaurant. An all-day Indian cafe Kerala-style pastries, chai and coffee are the specialty at Chayakada in San Jose. There are puff pastries filled with egg, beef or vegetables; several kinds of chai and Indian filter coffee. The spacious, 4,000-square-foot cafe in a South Bay shopping center offers ample seating, a free library and game room. 117 Bernal Road, Suite 80, San Jose. Popular San Francisco bar expands While Horsefeather is best known in San Francisco for its cocktails, its new sister location at Town & Country Village in Palo Alto is a large, full-service restaurant. Head there for dishes like a double cheeseburger, duck fat fries and miso-cream linguine. The bar menu features popular drinks from the San Francisco original, which opened in 2016, plus new creations and several non-alcoholic cocktails. A new Thai option There's no pad thai on the menu at Sen Thai Noodle in San Carlos. The Peninsula's newest Thai restaurant focuses instead on less Westernized dishes, including khao soi (a curry broth, crowned with egg noodles and a chicken drumstick, boat noodle soup (a fragrant soy broth with bouncy meatballs) and Thai beef jerky. The Peninsula's latest omakase option is Ren in Menlo Park, an eight-seat sushi restaurant from a team of Bay Area sushi veterans. They include Wen Zhao, previously a chef for 10 years at the once Michelin-starred Omakase in San Francisco; Jiabo Li of Iki Omakase in Palo Alto; and Sunny Noah, who worked at Omakase and the Michelin-starred edomae spot Sushi Yoshizumi in San Mateo, and has since opened Iki Omakase, Nagai Edomae Sushi in Redwood City and Tancho in Castro Valley. Ren's $198 menu features 18 to 20 courses of edomae-style dishes, including sushi made with seafood from Tokyo's Toyosu Market. A fast-growing matcha darling Japanese matcha cafe Maruwu Seicha just opened its third Bay Area location in a year. The newest outpost in San Jose, following San Francisco and Palo Alto, serves the cafe's popular, matcha lattes and soft serve ice cream.
San Francisco Chronicle
03-07-2025
- General
- San Francisco Chronicle
This hot Bay Area ramen spot had a 2-hour wait on opening day. Is it worth the hype?
Up until about a decade ago, I had mostly tried one kind of ramen: tonkotsu, with its thin, straight skeins and cloudy soup. Then Tsujita Artisan Noodle in Los Angeles introduced me to tsukemen, a Tokyo-born ramen where cold, thick noodles are served with a concentrated dipping broth. It was frequently named the best ramen restaurant in the region, with lines routinely snaking down the block, and it became my standard-bearer. Tsujita recently opened its first Bay Area outpost in West San Jose's Strawberry Park shopping plaza, a hot spot for Japanese food with several restaurants and the grocery store Mitsuwa Marketplace. On its grand opening weekend, the wait time was more than two hours. I haven't been to the Los Angeles restaurant in years, so I wondered if the new location would live up to my memory. It only took one bite to know the answer: yes. I'd put Tsujita in my top ramen spots in the Bay Area, especially since great tsukemen is in short supply here. It's a leading source for the ramen style, second only to Shutgetsu, which has locations in San Mateo and Fremont. On my dinner visit, I faced a line of nearly 50 people hugging the perimeter of a courtyard. I waited over a half hour before making it inside the snug shop awash in honey blonde wood. It was a packed house, with all 30 seats occupied by patrons noshing on jumbo chicken karaage or gleefully slurping down noodles. I ordered the deluxe tsukemen ($25.60). It came with two bowls: a cold one filled with a nest of yellow noodles, a lime wedge and a double helping of buttery braised pork slices; and another containing the warm dipping liquid. The latter was as potent as I remembered. A swirl of pork fat floated atop the murky brown broth, an intense distillation of richness, smokiness and umami with a fishy edge. How to eat tsukemen? Dunk the elongated noodles in the concentrated fluid and inhale them down the gullet. The lime provides flavor variance, a few drops over the noodles nicely mellows the reduced soup's intensity. Once you've reached the dregs, ask the staff to thin it out with complimentary chicken broth. While dipping ramen remains the draw, the tonkotsu, especially the spicy version ($18.95), is a wonderful alternative. The milky white pork broth is decadent, the noodles slightly firm and the heat level prickly but quick to dissipate. Tsujita debuted in 2003 in Tokyo before opening its first Los Angeles location in 2011. In the last decade, the operation has expanded to Texas, New Jersey and, now, San Jose. In its growth, the international ramen chain has maintained quality. While I think Tsujita is well worth the wait, line adverse patrons might want to wait a few weeks before visiting. There was one inconsequential detail that was absent on my visit: the pungent odor of long-simmered pork bones, which I associate with the initial Los Angeles location. I can't say I miss the scent, per se, but I affectionately view it as the perfume of Tsujita. Perhaps the smell is earned over time as it slowly settles into the walls. Tsujita Artisan Noodle. 11 a.m.-2 p.m., 5-9 p.m Monday-Thursday, 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Saturday-Sunday. 4330 Moorpark Ave., San Jose.
Yahoo
13-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Tokyo-founded ramen chain to open first Bay Area location in San Jose
(KRON) — A Tokyo-founded ramen spot is opening its first location in the Bay Area. Tsujita Artisan Noodle will open at 4330 Moorpark Ave. later this month, it announced on social media. The grand opening will be on Saturday, June 21. Tsujita will be located around the corner from Mitsuwa Marketplace. The restaurant will have 'warm wood, minimalist vibes, and Tokyo-style ramen energy,' Tsujita said on social media. K-pop sensation LE SSERAFIM to make Bay Area debut in newly announced tour Tsujita takes over the space that was previously occupied by Kahoo Ramen. 'We're thrilled to announce the grand opening of Tsujita! Join us for authentic Japanese ramen crafted with care and tradition. Our signature tsukemen and rich tonkotsu broth will finally arrive to the Bay Area,' Tsujita wrote on Instagram. Tsujita opened its first restaurant in Tokyo in 2003. It has grown in popularity by amassing more than 10,000 followers on its Instagram page. The ramen chain then made its United States debut in 2011 by opening in Los Angeles. There are currently six Tsujita restaurants in the U.S. — four in Southern California, one in Houston and one in New Jersey. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
