A ramen aficionado might scoff at the idea of a meatless broth. That pork or chicken essence, I'm told, is what gives ramen its characteristic hearty kick. There are, however, a handful of brave shops around Tokyo that can hold their own against those meaty bowls any day.
While vegetarian ramen shops are vastly outnumbered, these little strongholds are worth their repeated mentions not only for the vegetarians in town, but for the omnivores as well, as these are much more than just bowls of ramen sans meat.
T's TanTan is a vegan ramen restaurant located inside Tokyo Station (1-9-1 Marunouchi, Keiyo Street, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo; 03-3218-8040; www.ts-restaurant.jp/tantan) Here you'll find an assortment of ramen dishes and even a curry plate and rice bowls, none of which contain meat, fish, egg or dairy. Many of them do contain a textured topping made from soy protein, and though this use of beans clearly stems from a mock-meat mindset, the main focus of T's TanTan doesn't seem to be imitating the flavor of meat but rather offering a colorful palette of vegetable-based dishes for health and wellbeing. The walls in T's TanTan are peppered with posters of vegetables and a stylized mural of humans and animals proclaiming their love of all things veg.