Tokyo Ramen Street: a bowl before your train

Tokyo Station is a place most visitors pass through rather than visit. You step off a shinkansen or a commuter train, steer a suitcase through a maze of corridors, and head for the exit. But just below the crowds on the Yaesu side, there's a good reason to slow down: a short underground street lined with ramen shops, each one breathing steam and the smell of broth into the corridor.

That's Tokyo Ramen Street, and it may be the most convenient bowl of noodles in the country.

A ramen street under a railway station

Tokyo Ramen Street (東京ラーメンストリート) opened in 2009 in the underground shopping area on the Yaesu side of the station, part of the Tokyo Station Ichibangai complex. The idea is simple and very Japanese: gather a handful of well-known ramen shops in one corridor, so that a traveller with an hour to spare can choose between them.

The shops have changed over the years, with new names arriving and others moving on, so the line-up is never fixed. I think that rotation is part of the appeal. Rather than a museum of ramen, the street works more like a showcase, a place to try shops that are drawing attention at the time you happen to pass through.

One name tends to come up first: Rokurinsha (六厘舎), the tsukemen specialist, has been one of the best-known shops to have a branch there. If you've never tried dipping noodles, our guide to tsukemen explains why people queue for them.

What to expect when you get there

Each shop is its own small world, usually with a counter, a few tables and a line outside at busy times. Because the shops change, so does the mix of styles, but variety is the point: a clear, soy-seasoned bowl might sit a few doors from a thick, rich dipping broth.

The setting is a corridor in a busy station, not a quiet backstreet, and that shapes the experience. Staff manage the queues, people come and go with luggage and shopping bags, and meals are quick. It isn't the place for a long, lingering dinner. It is a very good place for a fast, serious bowl of ramen at the start or end of a journey.

Ekinaka: the art of the station meal

Ramen Street is part of a bigger story about how Japan eats on the move. There's a word, ekinaka (駅ナカ), literally "inside the station", for the shops and restaurants built into stations, especially those within the ticket gates. In recent decades, many large stations have become destinations in their own right, with bakeries, sweet shops, food courts and restaurants where there was once little more than a kiosk.

Railways have fed travellers for far longer than that. There's ekiben (駅弁), the boxed lunches sold at stations to eat on the train, many built around regional specialities. There's tachigui soba (立ち食いそば), stand-up soba counters on and around the platforms, where a hot bowl appears in moments and disappears almost as fast. And near many big stations you'll find department stores with basement food halls, depachika (デパ地下), whose glossy counters of pickles, sweets and prepared dishes are a sightseeing trip of their own.

Ramen Street sits naturally in that tradition: food built around the rhythm of travel, good enough to be worth a detour, quick enough to fit before a departure.

How to do it well

• Go early or go late. Lunchtime and the early evening bring the longest lines. Aim for the quieter shoulders of the day, before or after the main meal rushes.
• Check the line-up first. Because the shops change, look up who's there before you set your heart on a particular bowl.
• Deal with your luggage. Ramen counters are tight, and a big suitcase is awkward for everyone. Large stations have coin lockers, though they can fill up at busy times.
• Have your ticket sorted. Ramen shops often use a ticket machine, and some ask you to buy before you join the queue. Our ticket machine guide explains how it works.
• Leave a buffer for your train. Queues can move more slowly than you expect, and Tokyo Station is big. Give yourself time to find your platform.
• Eat, then make way. When people are waiting, finish your bowl and give up your seat.

There's something fitting about eating ramen in a railway station. It's a food made for busy people, served fast and eaten hot, and a good bowl just before a long train ride feels like the right way to begin a journey.