Little Tokyo

It doesn’t look like much, but we enjoyed staying in Little Tokyo while we were in Los Angeles. A little gritty, a little cheesy, but a little like being in Tokyo, we called this area around our hotel “home” for a few days. And when there are two yogurt shops, multiple restaurants, a karaoke bar, Japanese bread shop, souvenir shops, and a Family Mart all within a 2-block radius, that’s hard to complain about.

Little Tokyo likes its plazas. My favorite was the Japanese Village Plaza, a pedestrian maze with kitchy souvenir shops, izakaya, karaoke, and FroYo.

The Nijiya Market supplied us with a quick bento lunch one day when we were in a rush.

We never did try the karaoke or Frying Fish restaurants, but you always need to leave something to go back to, right?

People watching=one of my favorite free past times.

Our hotel, the Miyako Inn and Spa, was in a great location and had nice rooms for a decent price.

If we ever go back to Los Angeles, we would probably choose this location again if we wanted to be in the city. Beverly Hills is too fancy and Hollywood is too trendy.  Little Tokyo was just right.

ExperienceLA and the LTBA both have a great walking tours on their sites.

Orochon Ramen

My first meal in Los Angeles was a hurried one at Orochon Ramen in Little Tokyo. Ramen. What an amazing staple. It’s all the necessary food groups in one huge bottomless bowl: noodles, vegetables, meat, oil, soy.

Orochon is a tiny place (about 20 seats inside and 15 seats outside) that gets busy by 7:00. We arrived at 6:30, right before the rush, and got a table outside before the line started.

You pick between three broths: miso, soy sauce, and salt, and then pick your spicy level (#1 is “Extreme” and #7 is Non-Spicy). I ordered a #4 with soy sauce, corn, and negi. But this is what I got:

It was a #3 and it had corn, pork, negi, green pepper, bamboo, and seaweed.  Fine, we were in a hurry.  I wanted to finish the whole darn thing because it was so lip-slurping good, but the spice level was at least one, if not two, notches too high.  And my spicy level tolerance is pretty high to begin with.

Matt got a #4 miso broth with pork, negi, and garlic. His hunger was a bit stronger than the spiciness so he was able to finish more of his ramen.

I felt like I was in Tokyo. I really wish I could go back and try all of the different flavor and spicy combinations here because they were so tasty and authentic. But I would not eat inside because it reminds me a little bit too much of ramen shops in Tokyo.

City Search has details and a menu.