Ramen Kamo to Negi

The dashi (出汁) is made out of only three ingredients: the duck, negi (葱, Spring Onion), and water, and so the quality of each ingredient is paramount to the taste of the dashi. The broth is boiled each day, using specially selected duck meat, and slowly boiled over heat with negi and water to bring out the taste of both ingredients. No additional ingredients are used in the preparation of the dashi, making it the pure rich umami (旨味, Savoriness) from both the duck and the negi. It's a simple broth, yet turned up to the extremes through trial and error to bring out the best of the ingredients.

For the kaeshi (返し), specially selected top grade fresh shoyu (醤油, Shōyu, Soy Sauce) is used from Banshu-Kumano (播州熊野), Chiba (千葉県, Chiba-ken), Aichi (愛知県, Aichi-ken) that is mixed together to create a special house blend of shoyu. The duck is also specially selected from Kyoto (京都, Kyōto), Aomori (青森県, Aomori-ken), and Saitama (埼玉県, Saitama-ken) to be used in the dashi, and to be served as chashu (チャシュウ, Chashū, Roasted Pork) after being cooked as a confit. The water is also put through a filter multiple times in order to make it as pure as possible before being used in the dashi.

Duck broth ramen remains a rather novel concept today, despite quite a few shops having gone viral on social media. There are still not many shops that offer it today.

Kamo to Negi is definitely worth giving a try, especially if you're abit sick of the typical ramen broths. It does attract a significant queue of around 30 minutes or so, but the queue moves briskly as people whisk in and out of the shop.

The ramen itself is quite light and clear, but possibly a bit too light on taste for some. If you're looking for a strong and rich broth to hit you, you might be left disappointed. But if you're looking to enjoy the sweetness of duck meat in a broth, and a lighter meal at the end of the day, Kamo to Negi is a decently good choice. In our opinion, it is slightly overrated and it is definitely worth a try once, but it is not a shop we would return to often. The good thing is that they open rather late till 10.30pm, so if you're looking for a late-night food option in Tokyo, it's definitely a place to hit up. We'll give a higher score for its novelty factor of being a duck broth based ramen.

We highly recommend getting the Duck Confit Tempura because this is a dish we haven't seen anywhere else in Japan. The duck meat itself is juicy and slightly chewy, with a deliciously rich and sinful layer of fat at the top. The main downside of this dish is that the batter doesn't stick very well to the duck (due to its juiciness) and might slip off as a bit of a soggy outer coating. But the method of deep-frying really locks the flavour of the duck in, so while it may fail as a tempura dish, it has a high score as a delicious duck side dish.