Suehiro Ramen Honpo 「末廣ラーメン本舗」

After looking for recommendations for good food in Akita city, I came across this ramen chain Suehiro Ramen Honpo「末廣ラーメン本舗」, which has several branches across Japan, but mainly in the Tohoku area. One of their branches can be found at the JR Akita station, but many Japanese reviewers said that the food quality is much better at the main branch of this ramen chain.

Thus, I decided to go look for 「末廣ラーメン本舗 秋田山王本店」 – if you don’t understand Japanese, the word 本店 means the main branch (otherwise known as the very first shop which the chain started from).

It took us 30min to walk there from JR Akita station and it was definitely worth the effort!

The shopfront looks like an old traditional Japanese building. Upon entering, we found that there were only 10 counter seats.

The recommended dish is “Chukka Soba“「中華そば」, which is basically ramen noodles with a generous serving of pork slices in a delicious dark soy sauce soup base.

Diners have to use the vending machine located at the entrance, to purchase tickets for your food and then hand the tickets over to the chef at the counter.

Chukka Soba「中華そば」

I went with the recommended dish and it was absolutely delicious! The soup broth was flavourful and wasn’t overly salty, unlike most Japanese ramen. It tasted very much like a soy sauce pork dish that my late grandmother used to cook for me and thus it really warmed my heart and stomach!

Do note that the ramen is usually topped with spring onions (i.e. scallions), but due to my allergies, I requested for them to be omitted.

中華そばがおすすめです。スープに濃い醤油味、すごく美味しい！

If you love spring onions in your bowl of noodles, you can help yourself to as much as you want from the big bowl of spring onions placed at the counter. Unfortunately, the two elderly men who run this restaurant did not allow me to take any photos of the counter and the cooking area, so I can’t show it to you. I found it amusing that this bowl of free-flow spring onions seemed to be the highlight for many Japanese foodies who visit this ramen shop.

Overall, I was extremely satisfied with the food here and it’s definitely worth a try if you visit Akita!

Address:
末廣ラーメン本舗 秋田山王本店
2 Chome-2-4 Sannō, Akita-shi, Akita-ken 010-0951, Japan.
秋田県秋田市山王2-2-4 日興ビル1F （NHK横）
[Map]

Getting there:
30min walk from JR Akita station.
An 8-min ride on the Akita Chuo Bus from the West exit of JR Akita station. Alight at the “Akita Prefectural Office No. 2 Government Building”「県庁第二庁舎前」and it’s a 2-min walk from the bus stop.
秋田駅からラーメン屋まで歩いて三十分です。
秋田駅西口から秋田中央交通バスで8分「県庁第二庁舎前」下車、徒歩2分。

Opening Hours:
10am to 2am, but the shop may close anytime if the soup stock goes wrong or if the shop is in need of cleaning.
Typically closed on Mondays, but this is still subjected to changes.

Babahera Ice「ババヘラアイス」- a Rose-shaped ice cream sold by Grannies in Akita!

Babahera Ice「ババヘラアイス」 is an ice cream that is well known in Akita. These are usually sold from pushcarts along the streets by old ladies dressed in bright yellow and red aprons and donning yellow headscarves.

The name “Babahera” comes from the Japanese words baba「ババ」, a nickname for old women or grandmothers and hera「ヘラ」, which is the ice cream scoop or spatula.

The uniqueness of these roadside vendors is that they scoop the ice cream into the shape of a rose! There is only one flavour available – banana, which is not in my list of favourites.

The ice cream wasn’t of the creamy kind and its texture felt more like a slushee. Tastewise, the Minions would probably enjoy the banana flavour more than I did, but it was still an icy treat to cool you down on a hot summer’s day! One serving of babahera ice costs ¥200.

I had seen many of these grannies selling babahera ice during my walk in Akita City, but only this particular lady, who had strategically parked her cart along the pedestrian arcade in front of the JR Akita station, was a spritely character and she did a little dance whilst scooping the ice cream! If you are visiting Akita, do look out for this friendly granny with a big warm smile!