Japan Travel Guide / Tokyo Station Souvenirs & Ramen Street

Five selections of souvenirs at Tokyo Station and Ramen Street. Samurai Junjiro Channel. Hi, I'm Samurai Junjiro, born and raised in Japan. In today's video, we'll be sharing souvenirs that you can purchase in Tokyo Station and Ramen Recommendation. From classic to recent debut, we'll eat and compare five different souvenirs. We'll also be covering everyone's favorite ramen stores that people line up to every day, so stay on the channel. Make sure to watch until the end as the video contains viral information for traveling. Now, let's get started. We are here at Tokyo Station. Today, we are headed to the most gathered souvenir store in Tokyo Ramen Street in the station. Don't forget that in Japan, you can actually go inside the ticket gate to stroll around when you purchase entrance fee at the ticketing booth. We also introduced seven different ekiben that you can get at Tokyo Station in the past. The URL will be listed in the description box, so make sure to check that out too. The souvenir shop is actually located right in the eyes of ekiben store that we previously got our bentos from. This is where we wanted to stop by to introduce and it's called Hanagataya. There are two stores that line six and seven always crowded with people traveling around Japan. We bought souvenirs that you can buy from the store and we picked out top five that are especially sold well. There will be other souvenirs announced in the video, so also look forward to those too. Now, let's first pick out the souvenir that has been around in Tokyo for more than 50 years. It's this hyoko. Its origin actually started from Fukuoka Prefecture 110 years ago, but it was sold as souvenir in Tokyo for 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games and have stayed until this day. It's one of the many souvenirs that represent Tokyo. The souvenir is in the shape of chick. It's adorable. The dough, which is a mixture of sugar, flour, and egg are put in the oven. The outside is moist with sweet white kidney beans filling inside. This is perfect with hot green tea. Next up is Tokyo Banana. In Tokyo Station, you can find one-of-a-kind store that sells goods with Pokemon collaboration. You can get Pikachu packaged Tokyo Banana in those store. The store is limitedly in Tokyo Station, Narita, and Haneda International Airports, so make sure to stop by when you visit the designated areas. Today, we'll share other souvenirs that Tokyo Banana producer creates. And it's Ginza no Ichigo cake. This was sold for over 10 years but was recently renewed for even tastier souvenir. It's nice that the cakes are individually wrapped. The sponge is in the shape of strawberry and the seeds are also perfectly recreated too. Inside the fluffy sponge, it's two different creams of milk and strawberry. The refreshing strawberry and the sweet milk flavor really complements the sponge. This would surely be perfect pair to coffee. We'd like to touch on Goma Tamago by Tokyo Tamago. This has been popular ever since its debut in 2001. The one we picked has eight portions but there is smaller portion with five. This dessert is in egg shape. The castella dough is coated with white chocolate. Let's check for the filling. Inside is packed with black sesame paste. The aroma of black sesame and the sweetness of the white chocolate are a hit together. It was shared on SNS that the dessert would be tastier when chilled in the refrigerator. You can also get custard pudding too. Inside the egg mimic container, it's smooth and creamy custard pudding. The pudding also has black sesame sauce too. Now to the next souvenir. Next souvenir is from Sugar Butter Sand Tree. This was first sold in Tokyo's neighbor prefecture in Omiya Station, Saitama but has been stuck as souvenir of Tokyo. This snack is cereal cookie sandwich with butter and sugar kneaded in the dough. It's distinct with crispy and light mouthfeel. The cookie sandwich is white chocolate as a filling. The filling has strong milk flavor and moderately sweet. You can also find the store in Haneda Airport and from there you can get limited goods. The limited one has mocha blended so it has slight bitterness. Give it a try if you ever take off from Haneda. Next is Bamkuchen from Nenrinya. Nenrinya was founded in Tokyo Ginza in 2007 and has been a Bamkuchen specialist since. The cake has sugar coating for crispy mouthfeel. It's fluffy and moist inside. I'm sensing strong butter. Feeling so heavenly with mouth full of sweetness. And this wraps the souvenirs. Let's now move to try out ramen. You'd want to move to first basement floor near Yaesu Central Exit. First Avenue Tokyo Station on the basement floor has countless restaurants and stores and our target place is located in the area. This is the Tokyo Ramen Street which we wanted to highlight. The street began in 2009 and currently has 7 ramen stores. All of the stores are equally popular with people lining up for ramen at lunch hours. Within the 7 stores is Rokurinsha, a store which Tsukemen was made well known. The store has lines every day and could wait for more than hour. But there's a souvenir corner in Rokurinsha so you can bring back delicious noodles and enjoy at comfort of your home. Let me pick up 2 different souvenirs that you can get. The first one being the dumpling. You'd want to place the dumpling on a flying pan with bread sesame oil and place on heat. Then you'll add water to steam with a lid. When most of the water has evaporated, you'll take the lid off. Finish off with a little slurr of sesame oil and done when the bottom of the dumpling skin has golden brown finishes. The skin is looking crispy and delicious. The dumplings from Rokurinsha is so big and fill stomach. Let's try with soy sauce, vinegar and hot chili sauce. The skin is thick with chewy texture. The store uses good portion of beef meat in the filling so the juice is overflowing. It's so addictive with plenty of garlic, chive and ginger. Wishing I had beer to go with this. Next is the top seller at Rokurinsha which is tsukemen. You'll first prepare soup by pouring the broth in hot boiling water. In a separate pan, you'd cook the noodle with hot water. Once this is done, you drain the water. You can't forget to rinse the noodles until all the flour is gone. Place the noodle on a plate once ready. In a separate bowl, put soy sauce and pour in the soup prepared in the beginning. It's finally complete when you add the fish meal in the soup. It's looking authentic with no difference to store prepared tsukemen. Glad to be able to enjoy the line forming noodles at home. The scent of soup with fish meal is fantastic. The soup tastes rich in seafood. It tastes clean and sharp with moderate fat. Unlike its appearance, the soup comes with bamboo shoots in braised pork belly. The pork is huge and juicy. The bamboo shoots are thick with crunchy texture. Noodles are quite filling with thickness and smells appetizing with flour. Let's try dipping the noodles inside the soup. The noodles really catch the rich sauce and taste amazingly bomb. It's another level quality and you can't believe it's been prepared at home. Let's now try ramen from the ramen street. We want to draw your attention to this store right here. This is Hirugao specializing in salt ramen. Hirugao is a popular shop with five different stores in Tokyo and Osaka other than Tokyo station. We'll compare two different ramen. You want to get tickets at a booth first. First ramen to try is a top seller of salt ramen. This ramen is made only with the limited ingredients and flavored with luxury salt from Vietnam. The aroma of anchovies and chicken bones are smelling stunning. The soup also includes broth from scallop. Despite its simple look, the flavor is rich and bold. It comes with green onion, bamboo shoots, braised pork belly, and seaweed lava for toppings. The salt-based soup really elevates each toppings. The noodle is thin, individually coating the broth well. Even the noodles are made restrictively with flour from Hokkaido, so it has great aroma. Now to the next ramen. The final ramen we want to touch on is tsukemen. Tsukemen from Hirugao are another favorite of many. When compared to the original ramen we just had, it uses thicker noodles. The soup has relative acidity and tastes rich. The chopped green onions are a great add-on. This tsukemen comes with plenty of shrimp wontons and braised pork belly. The combination to the rich salt-based soup are on point. I love how it comes with half-boiled egg too. I'd recommend to soak the egg into the soup before you take a bite. Let's try dipping the noodles into the soup. The combination of rich soup and chewy noodles are the best. No surprise that many people gather to dine in. My personal advice is to come around 3 in the afternoon since lunch hours are crowded without exception. If there's a restaurant you'd like me to introduce, let me know in the comments. Please like and subscribe to my channel too. Well, that's it for today. See you in the next video!