Daikokuya

For Japanese food

I dined this week at the most vile culinary hovel on this planet, a wretched, woe-be-gone hangdog of a joint that hasn’t any right to serve meals to humans. It inexplicably has its admirers, people who pretend to enjoy food but only wish to cram foodstuff down their gullet. I refer, of course, to the execrable Yoshinoya. Anyone who tells you that “Yoshinoya is great!” is a liar. Either that or they are secretly your worst enemy. I had forgotten why I hadn’t been to this franchise in years and quickly remembered after I ordered the beef bowl with a miso soup chaser. The miso soup came late and it was easily the worst plate of food I had in a long, long time. Its rancid, salty metallic taste was still in my mouth the next day. How to get it out? I needed a replacement Japanese joint and quick. I scanned my 99 list. Daikokuya. Whenever I am in Little Tokyo I stop at Suehiro but I was more than happy to go someplace different. My goal was to order a miso soup, a real miso soup. The menu didn’t have it but what they did have, in big bold letters was this sign: “DAIKOKUYA RAMEN—Daikokuya Ramen is noodles, boiled egg, seasoned bamboo shoots, bean sprouts, and green onions in pork soup. Our original soup is made from soy sauce and boiling pork bones for nearly a full day. We only use Kurobata or black pork, known for its tenderness and unique flavor. Our eggs are soaked in a special sauce all through the night before serving.” I ask you, would you ignore such a sign? Would you pass this sign in favor of sanitized, tasteless beef bowls and packaged miso soups with a slice of room temperature cheese cake on the side? I didn’t. I also ordered a tuna roll and slapped some wasabi on it, of course. With about a gallon of green iced tea this meal more than took the bad taste out of my mouth. The D. Ramen noodles swim in a hearty, meat texture broth. It is one of those dishes you cannot help but finish but feel a little guilty when you do. This is a place I will come back to again and again. I only wish there was a Daikokuya on California and Tweedy and not that pretend Japanese joint.