Fortunate enough to visit NYC around 4x yr. for work and IMHO this city has the best (and most ramen) in the US. The ‘holy trinity’ of NYC shops is Totto, Ippudo and most recently Momofuku noodles?? and I recently had a chance to visit Totto for the 2nd time.
Totto is differntiated by their soup which is paitan tori…or very thick chicken (vs. pork) broth. I will admit I am a soup vs. noodles guy at the end of the day and I like rich, flavorful, deep flavors (i.e. fatty) therefore I am not usually a fan of chicken stock. However Totto is not one of the top ramen joints in the US for no reason…their chicken broth is thick (hence..paitan) very similiar in milky texture to tonkotsu ramen, with a great balance of depth and fattiness while not being overwhleming as some find rich tonkotsu.
The noodles are thin and made locally for their shop and do a great job of carrying the almost creamy soup. Toppings are modest and the Totto touch is in their pork which is flame heated before serving to release the fat and lightly carmelize the tender pieces. Most recently I had the spicy ramen which I assumed would come loaded w/either ra-yu oil or kimchee…instead it came with some type of hard peppers which were marinated in ra-yu adding a nice crunchy texture (but possibly not enough heat for some).
Overall if you enjoy ramen Totto is one of the tops in the US, my other visit was 18-24 months ago and as you’d expect had an identical experience. Be prepared to wait at least 30-45 minutes to get in and when you do say hi to Jun who came to NYC from Hokkaido to break dance and learn english.
Up next…in the coming weeks I’ll post some stuff on the local Seattle scene but in case I’m (much) longer than planned my #1 in Seattle has been Fu-Lin since they opened their doors around 9 (already??) years ago.
RR
ramenranger 
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