SEE Magazine
Copyright © 1998. All Rights Reserved.
ON THE MENU
BY GILBERT A. BOUCHARDEver since it opened just short of a year ago, I've been a regular visitor to the Tokyo Noodle Shop & Sushi Bar (10736-82 Ave.), located in the beautiful Garneau Lofts building. This comfortable eatery - light, airy and serving an excellent selection of Japanese food items varying from the fancy to the super-comfortable - became a neighborhood haunt overnight.
For me, nothing is more relaxing after a hard day than popping into the Tokyo Noodle Shop and having a big, steaming bowl of pork or chicken Ramen (thin noodles in a soup base). Not only that, the arrival of the Tokyo Noodle Shop meant I also had a place I could take friends who like sushi that's both close to my apartment and serves a whole bunch of menu items I like as well. Those include dishes like Gyoza (tasty meat and vegetable dumplings), Beef Sashimi (raw, paper-thin beef served cold with a ponsu sauce, horseradish and kelp - a superb warm-weather dish) or Tempura. (okay, confession time folks: I'm not fond of sushi with the exception of Kappa Maki - cucumber roll. Kappa Maki I like. Kappa Maki I could live on, but that's just me.)
I've also enjoyed the fact that owner Donovan Webber and his staff are so incredibly friendly and make a habit of getting to know their regular customers by name. A real attention to detail permeates every iota of this restaurant. Webber's passion and dedication is almost palatable.
When I asked Webber where he got the idea to open the shop, the soft-spoken 28-year-old said that after living in Japan for five years, he wanted to come back to Canada and open a business that would accommodate his bi-national connections and allow him to share some of the excitement of Tokyo with Edmontonians. (He's also planning to bring some of the charm of Western Canada to Tokyo by opening a pub-style restaurant/bar called The Edmonton, but that's another story.)
What surprised me was Webber didn't set out to open the Tokyo Noodle Shop in its current form. Initially, he planned a smaller shop in the Garneau Lofts that would have served only noodles, like similar shops in Japan. Webber says noodle shops in Tokyo are like fast-food outlets here and can be found on every street corner.
Suspecting that Edmontonians might not immediately understand the concept of a noodles-only shop, Webber decided to open the larger restaurant that would offer other Japanese dishes and sushi as well as noodles.
Needless to say, the restaurant has been a big hit and Edmontonians have really taken to noodles - so much so that Webber is, once again, contemplating a noodle-only shop.
As for the review portion of this article (thought I had forgotten, didn't you?), Webber had a real challenge trying to find items that we hadn't eaten before. He ended up serving my companion and I the Salmon Karaage and the Udon - both excellent choices and, surprisingly, two dishes we had managed to overlook on the menu (must be getting sloppy in my old age). The Salmon Karaage is an especially delightful appetizer. Beautiful chunks of fresh salmon, lightly deep-fried and served with a subtly sweet sauce and thin slices of white onion. A real sophisticated snack.
The Udon is the thick noodle dish (as opposed to the thin Ramen noodles). I was surprised how wonderfully light the noodles are and how delightfully varied this dish is, chock full of chicken, crab, tempura prawn and a pleasantly sweet wafer of tofu. A real treasure chest of culinary delight. But that's the beauty of noodle dishes - you're able to endlessly dress them up.
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