Hanam Misa ramen restaurant with mini mentaiko rice combo: Menji

Menji Hanam Misa Branch: a ramen restaurant hidden inside a bakery

Menji Hanam Misa Branch is a chicken-broth ramen restaurant at 36 Misagangbyeon-buk-ro 30beon-angil, 1F, Hanam-si, Gyeonggi-do. It's open daily 11:00–20:30, with a weekday break from 15:00 to 17:00 and last order at 20:00. There's no parking, so you'll need to use a nearby public lot. The shop has Wi-Fi, separate men's and women's restrooms, a high chair, and a waiting area.

I had business in Hanam and got a craving for hot ramen, so I visited Menji Hanam Misa Branch! Turns out you have to walk into a bakery to find the little shop inside. Such an odd, fun layout.

Can you eat alone? Inside Menji's small bar-seat dining room

The place is really small and pretty — cozy, cute little details everywhere. I sat at the bar, and it felt like a comfortable spot for solo diners too. Besides the bar there are only two or three tables for families or groups! Customers kept streaming in the whole time, so it seemed like a spot already well known in the neighborhood.

What is tori paitan ramen?

Menji's ramen moves away from the usual pork-broth tonkotsu style and instead uses chicken broth, which apparently makes it lighter and cleaner-tasting. I had no idea what tori paitan meant either — whenever I go to a ramen shop I always end up googling this stuff.

• Tori (鶏): Japanese for chicken
• Paitan (白湯): literally "white soup," meaning a cloudy, milky broth

I was kind of tempted to try the spicy tori paitan ramen or the tantanmen, but really, when it comes to ramen the pale, non-spicy kind is the right call. According to my own big data, anyway.

No matter what anyone says, I walk my own foodie path.

What we ordered and the price: tori paitan ramen + mini rice combo, 13,500 won

The menu had quite a variety. After a lot of deliberating I went with the tori paitan ramen + mini rice combo for ₩13,500! I wanted the karaage don too, but when you visit a place, ordering the signature dish is always the right answer. Among the mini rice options there was cheese rice and mentaiko rice, and I picked the mentaiko rice.

So cute... ugh. Just one Crayon Shin-chan figure... please. There are honestly so many adorable little props tucked around the shop.

The spoon and chopsticks were tucked in here like this. Overall the place felt kept really clean.

Pepper, rayu (Japanese chili oil), and Japanese-style pickled mustard greens were set out, and once the food arrived you just help yourself to as much as you want!

How Menji's tori paitan ramen tasted

The mini mentaiko rice came out first. I guess it's meant to be eaten alongside the ramen.

Here's the tori paitan ramen. For everything else I usually prefer spicy or very spicy flavors, but not with ramen. I like the pale, milky kind... or maybe miso...~ Compared to a pork-broth-based ramen it wasn't so much rich as it was light and clean — a bit cleaner-tasting than dakkalguksu (chicken noodle soup) broth, actually.

The rice was a bit hard... colder and firmer than I expected, so I basically ate it dunked in the broth.

How pepper and rayu chili oil change the chicken broth

Couldn't skip trying it with pepper and rayu. I'm a total pepper addict so I dumped in a ton, and it gave the broth way more depth and a sharper kick. Even without them, the broth itself was clean and delicious on its own!

Adding rayu gave it a slight kick along with more aroma, so I finished the bowl with a bit of rayu mixed in. Also, there was a really generous amount of chicken char siu in the bowl. That's the part that usually gets skimped on if a shop is being stingy with the meat, so I appreciated it.

Can you see the empty bowl? Between the light broth and the thin noodles I love, before I knew it everything was gone.

Menji Hanam Misa Branch: what to order and what to skip

• Recommended if you want clean, light ramen
• Recommended if you want to eat a variety of Japanese food in a spotless, clean shop
• Recommended if you like chicken broth, or if you're tired of the smell of pork broth and want a different kind of ramen
• Not recommended if you love the deep, rich flavor of pork broth specifically

I enjoyed it, but personally I still prefer a deep pork broth.

If you're ever in Hanam Misa, how about giving the pale chicken-broth ramen at Menji a try?