ちゃぶ屋 chabuya: sawtelle's one-note samba
Sometimes you put your best foot foward and go the extra mile, yet you still can’t get it quite right. Chabuya is certainly an inspiration for pulling out all the stops - organic ingredients from Ventura County farms, kurobuta pork from Canadian ranches. Sleek, shiny interiors worthy of a SoHo loft and a pedigree chef from Tokyo boasting “the finest ramen in all Japan.”
Nice try. Maybe I can’t shake the hype, but I somehow manage to expect a next-level experience every time (and there have been many) I walk into Chabuya Tokyo Noodle Bar on Sawtelle. Prior to opening late in the fall of 2005, the proprietors encloaked the shop window with a gigantic poster of star chef Yasuji Morizumi tending to boules of uncooked ramen. The display bore no caption or announcement; it seemed only to say “it’s coming.”
I remember jumping up and down in excitement during a late-night drive-by to investigate the poster. The branding on Morizumi’s smock bore the Chabuya logo, and anticipation began to build. You see, Chabuya is reputedly a top-flight shoyu-tonkotsu ramen shop in Japan, with its own instant ramen to match. Although I had never eaten there, I was pretty sure we were in for something special.
And now that it’s here, what do we have exactly? Ramen, yes. Best on the Westside, MAYBE. Ramen-ya acolytes may disagree, but you really can’t compare an assari-kei ramen shop to a kotteri-kei like Chabuya, which specializes in a “rich” broth style. But is it really next-level ramen? Hardly. Rather, depending on how you look at it, it’s either an occasionally exceptional but wildly inconsistent study in ramen or a spectacular, overhyped failure.
How so? Quite frankly, Chabuya’s “classic” shoyu-tonkotsu broth is, at least in North American translation, a one-note samba. I was there opening night, and have been checking up on the place regularly. Many of the restaurant’s initial wave of diners complained that the broth was far too salty. Okay, as someone who admittedly used to lick the flavor packets from six-for-a-dollar portions of Maruchan, I have to respectfully disagree (assuming I can still be credible). Over the course of my ramen travels, I’ve learned that it’s not so much the salt as the fact that a next-level bowl of ramen needs to have a multi-dimensional soup. In Chabuya’s case, the saltiness stood out because there was nothing else to it. Even the staff has heard the complaints. They’ve toned down the broth somewhat, but I think they’re missing the point. There needs to be something else there, an undercurrent of sweetness perhaps, to make it work.
It’s a work in progress, I’d like to think. On opening night, the handmade noodles were limp, lacking in bite. To quote a fellow rameniac, they didn’t “fight back.” In ensuing months, they began to exhibit some verve, as perhaps the chefs got used to cooking with local water (Japanese kansui apparently cannot be imported). It helps also if you order “katamen” - firm noodles, and the “karakara ramen”, which includes a dollop of spicy ground pork in your bowl, definitely kicks the flavor up a notch. Everything IS supremely fresh; the toppings for sure are top-grade. But the soup… oh, the soup…
All this is not to say that I don’t like Chabuya. Like a lover who fails to live up to her potential, I have such high expectations for the place that it only frustrates me how she can’t get it quite right. Maybe it’s Morizumi’s insistence on organic ingredients for his “premium” ramen that is as much a detriment as it is a selling point. At times I just wanted to blindside my bowl with a non-existent shaker of MSG.
No, I don’t ask or expect perfection from most of the other ramen shops in town. But a samba with such style could use a bridge or two. Somebody teach Chabuya a few more chords.
| one-dimensional shoyu tonkotsu that many find too salty for lack of flavor depth. why can’t this be better? thoroughly mix in the fried garlic chips and you get an almost-passable soup. order the karakara ramen for maximum effect. | 4.5 |
| thin and wiry, but limp and without much tooth. they don’t “fight back.” compensate by asking for katamen, firm noodles. | 6 |
| decent; karakara ground pork adds a lot to the flavor of the soup overall. chashu is tender and the negi is fresh. how do they cram so much into a such a small bowl? | 6 |
| gyoza are pan-fried on the light side. shumai are decent as well; everything is a a touch light, fresh, and healthy. | 6 |
| nice modernist decor lifts the spirits. the lamp at the entrance is from IKEA. what’s with the big wall with chabuya plaques written all over it? it’s as though they want to pretend they have more shops than they actually do. | 8 |
| a heroic effort at “upscaling” ramen makes you warm and fuzzy inside. | 2.5 |
2002 Sawtelle Blvd | 16.5 |
chabuya no tare ha oishikunai!