Amateur Review - Mitsuyado Sei-Men

July 14, 2014 — My mom wanted to treat us to dinner at this ramen place she was raving about. Boy was I glad we ate there. The name of the place? Mitsuyado Sei-Men.

According to my mom, this place became known because of this cheese tsukemen dish they serve. What is tsukemen? Apparently it's ramen that is served separately from the broth. So it's sort of like dipping the noodles in the broth before you eat it.

The restaurant's facade

The inside of Mitsuyado Sei-Men reminded me of some ramen places in Japan. They have this old school look. I'd go so far as to say the decor made it look like a "classy carinderia"  for lack of a better term.

The decor inside the restaurant

There were also tons of decor from Japan. So there really is a great Japanese vibe to the restaurant. Now that we've established the ambience, how would the food fare?

The decor inside the restaurant

Mom got some chicken karaage and gyoza for starters. They were pretty decent, not that great. Personally, I think it wasn't a good idea to get the side dishes for the simple reason that the portions of the dishes were huge. The karaage and gyoza were just extra calories. I'm not saying they tasted bad, they were okay. I've had better, and I've definitely had worse.

Chicken Karaage and Gyoza for starters

Then came my main course - Jumbo Chashu Tsukemen. This is my first time ever eating tsukemen. I never bothered to try it in Japan. What can I say about my dish? It was great. The chashu was "fork tender" and almost disintegrated if manhandled with the chopsticks.

The broth was salty but not overpowering. You could still taste the other ingredients in the broth, and they complement the chashu strips and the cold noodles. Yes, I chose to have cold noodles per the recommendation of our server. And it was definitely a good call, since the broth was relatively hot. The broth was so good I finished it up with the spoon you can see in the lower right of the picture below. I don't think you're supposed to do that, but the broth was that damn good.

Jumbo Chashu Tsukemen (regular size) for me

So would I go back there again? Absolutely. I saw a couple of items in the menu that I would love to try next time (I'm looking at you, curry ramen). The price was a bit on the high side, but it was definitely worth it. The taste was good, the service was decent, and the portions didn't leave me feeling like they skimped on ingredients like a certain ramen place we went to before.

Finally, do I have some complaints about the place? Yes. One, they don't have service water. They do have service cold tea, though. Two, the ceiling aircon drips. I had a drop splatter on my menu once, then again on my arm after I moved to the side a bit to avoid it. So if you're not careful or aware, you could be slurping on aircon drippings. I hope I didn't.

Those two faults I saw were pretty minor, well not really the second one. If that gets worse it could be an issue for other diners.

In closing, despite the two minor annoyances I would definitely recommend Mitsuyado Sei-Men to anyone who likes ramen. The food was good, the portions were decent, and the ambiance was nice. Just don't sit under the aircon vents.

For those of you interested in trying the place out, I took a picture of their address. Here you go:

Here's their address in case you want to visit

Out.