Wagamama is here!

When I first met my wife she had recently returned from working abroad in London. Of all the stories and adventures she told there was one place that was near and dear to her heart: Wagamama. Wagamama is an asian-inspired noodle shop that is modeled after the fast food ramen shops that can be found throughout Japan. She lamented that the one problem about being back in the states was that though they can be found in numerous countries across the globe, they had yet to open a restaurant here in the US.

Sarah was so excited when she saw the “coming soon” construction billboards covering the windows of the now defunct Tod English’s Tuscan Grill resteraunt in Boston’s Fanuil Hall that she immediatly emailed Wagamama’s to express her glee. The great part is that someone from wagamamas emailed her back and invited us to a preview week opening and free tickets for dinner.

triple. word. score.

One word of caution to Americans who have never experienced Wagamama: they do things a little differently. For one thing they do not have “appetizers” and “main courses”. Instead they have “side dishes” and everything else. Americans may have to get a little used to the Wagamamas style of ordering.

The waitstaff comes to your table and takes your order on a nifty wireless device that transmits your order back to the kitchen (these are seen throughout Europe and it amazes me that it hasn’t caught on here in the US). They then writes your order down on your placemat and wisks off to another table. The cryptic writing is to let the server know who gets what and for tallying up the bill at the end. The order in which food come to your table can vary. Wagamama bills itself as “fast food” but not in the greasy, sit under a hotlight wrapped in paper still some shmo comes along to buy it, kind of fast food. Because of this, food comes out not in the order that you might expect but in the order of whatever is currently fresh out of the pan back in the kitchen.

Our side dishes actually came out first (though I saw a confused couple at the table next to us later in the evening when it didn’t). I ordered the duck gyoza, five little fried duck and leek dumplings served with hosin sauce. Who orders duck and leeks at a “fast food” joint anyhow? They were pretty good but not as good as the ebi gyoza that Sarah order that were the same dumplings but filled with black tiger shrimp, water chestnut and spinach, served with a spicy citrus ponzu sauce. Those simply rocked!

Sarah ended up getting her favorite: ginger chicken udon, which is a teppan fried udin noodle dish that was really good. I opted for the miso beef ramen soup that had a great presentation of perfectly cooked steak a top a spicy ramen soup with sprouts, cilantro, sliced scallion and a wedge of lime. yum!

Here’s Sarah enjoying her fist Wagamama-US meal.

This post would not be complete without an homage to Wagamama’s signature image of someone tipping back their ramen bowl.

Wagamama is also opening up a second location over in Cambridge’s Harvard Square. I hope to check out that place and review it here as well.

Cheers!

Craig