Picking Your First Ramen Bowl at Men-Eiji Sapporo
A bowl of ramen might look simple from the outside, but the moment your spoon cuts through the glossy surface of a slow-simmered broth, you realise how much craft sits behind it. For travellers landing in Hokkaido for the first time, the choice at the counter can feel overwhelming, especially at a place like Men-Eiji, where the team has spent more than a decade refining a single style of broth until it sings.
Men-Eiji's reputation has grown far beyond Sapporo. Australian food lovers who follow the international ramen scene will already know the brand from collaborations in Sydney and pop-ups hosted during winter events in Melbourne. A bowl here is not a casual lunch stop; it is a planned experience, and knowing which bowl to order first will shape how you remember the meal.
The Broth Behind the Bowl
Every ramen shop has a broth philosophy, and at Men-Eiji the foundation is gyokai-tonkotsu, a double-stock that draws deep umami from pork bones and oceanic richness from dried sardines, scallops, clams and select fish. The bones simmer for hours, the seafood is added in stages, and the temperature is held just below a boil to keep the liquid clear rather than cloudy. Founder Jun Furukawa's obsession with this balance is documented in a record of his broth experiments, which traces years of small adjustments.
For an Australian diner used to thicker, heavier tonkotsu styles served in Sydney's CBD or along Melbourne's Hardware Lane, the difference is immediate. The broth here carries weight without feeling greasy, and the seafood notes open up as the bowl cools. Eating slowly is the trick, as is lifting the noodles with chopsticks rather than a spoon so each strand gets a thin coat of fat before it reaches your mouth.
The toppings are deliberately restrained. A soft-boiled egg marinated in shoyu, a slice of chashu, a curl of menma, finely chopped spring onions and a single sheet of nori. Nothing is added for show, and the bowl reads like a sentence rather than a paragraph, each element doing a specific job.
The Two Flagship Bowls
For newcomers, the menu really offers two anchors. The first is the signature shoyu ramen, dressed with a darker, aged soy that sharpens the broth's mineral edge. The second is the shio ramen, where sea salt lets the gyokai notes step forward. Both use the same noodles, both use the same tare family, and the difference is essentially a tuning choice, like choosing between a pinot noir and a chardonnay when you sit down at a restaurant in Adelaide's wine country.
If you eat pork, the duck chashu version at Duck Ramen EIJI is worth treating as a separate category. The duck is confit-style, the fat rendered until it melts, and the broth underneath shifts slightly to accommodate it. Many Australian visitors find this the more memorable bowl, in part because duck rarely appears in mainstream ramen in Australia, where chicken or pork chashu dominates.
Men-Eiji also runs a calendar of seasonal specials tied to Hokkaido's produce. In summer you might find corn or shiso appearing, in winter a heavier miso variant surfaces, and around cherry blossom season there is usually a clear, lighter broth designed to match the weather. For visitors planning a trip around Hokkaido's snow festival, the winter menu is the most developed.
Two Sapporo Locations, Two Slightly Different Experiences
Men-Eiji operates two distinct restaurants in Sapporo, and the choice between them matters for first-time visitors. MEN-EIJI Hiragishi BASE is the original, a tight, focused counter where the kitchen is the centre of the room and the broth is the headline. It suits diners who want a classic, stripped-back experience and who are happy to queue for fifteen or twenty minutes during peak hours.
Duck Ramen EIJI, located in a different neighbourhood, leans further into the duck concept. The seating is slightly more relaxed, the menu adds a few small plates, and the signature bowl incorporates duck in multiple forms rather than as a single topping. Travellers who fly into New Chitose and head straight into Sapporo for a long weekend often choose this location on day one because it gives a fuller picture of what the kitchen can do.
Both restaurants are part of the same small operation, and staff rotate between them. The reservation culture in Sapporo is also worth understanding before you arrive. Unlike Tokyo, where queues at famous shops can stretch for an hour, Sapporo counters tend to use a numbered ticket system outside, particularly in winter when nobody wants to stand in minus-ten wind chill longer than necessary. Showing up before 11.30am or after 1.30pm usually means a calmer entry.
What Sets Men-Eiji Apart
Recognition in the ramen world does not come easily, and Men-Eiji has accumulated a stack of it. The brand holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand, has appeared on multiple Japanese best-of lists, and Jun Furukawa has run pop-ups in cities including Sydney, Singapore and Taipei. For Australian diners, the Sydney appearances in particular have built a quiet but loyal following, the kind of audience that books Hokkaido trips around a single bowl rather than the other way around.
The kitchen also approaches presentation with the kind of discipline Australians might associate with high-end sushi counters. The plating of every component, from the angle of the chashu slice to the position of the nori, follows a logic that prioritises both function and eye. A look at how a New York sushiya plates each roll gives a sense of this attention, and the same standards apply to Men-Eiji's bowls.
Inside Japan, Men-Eiji is also a respected training ground. Several chefs who passed through the kitchen have gone on to open their own shops, and the staff turnover is low by industry standards. For visitors, this means the team you meet in 2025 is largely the team you would have met three years ago, and the consistency of the broth from visit to visit is not an accident.
Picking What Suits You
A practical way to decide is to think about what you want the bowl to communicate. The comparison below outlines the main options and the kind of diner each one suits best.
| Bowl | Location | Broth Style | Best For | Flavour Focus |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Shoyu Ramen | MEN-EIJI Hiragishi BASE | Gyokai-tonkotsu, aged soy | First-timers who want a balanced, classic bowl | Mineral, savoury, rounded |
| Shio Ramen | MEN-EIJI Hiragishi BASE | Gyokai-tonkotsu, sea salt | Diners who want the seafood notes to lead | Briny, clean, delicate |
| Duck Chashu Ramen | Duck Ramen EIJI | Gyokai-tonkotsu, duck fat base | Visitors who want something more indulgent and unusual | Rich, gamey, layered |
| Seasonal Special | Both locations, rotating | Varies by season | Repeat visitors or longer stays in Hokkaido | Depends on month, often produce-driven |
| Miso Ramen (winter) | MEN-EIJI Hiragishi BASE | Gyokai-tonkotsu, red miso | Travellers visiting during Hokkaido's snow season | Earthy, warming, hearty |
If you have only one bowl in Sapporo, the shoyu at Hiragishi BASE is the safest and most complete introduction. If you have two meals to spare, pair it with the duck at Duck Ramen EIJI and you will have covered both ends of the menu.
Australian food labelling laws require restaurants to declare the presence of common allergens, and the team at Men-Eiji can flag soy, wheat, egg, pork, seafood and sesame on request. If you are travelling with someone who has a shellfish intolerance, the duck option is friendlier because the broth is still seafood-based but can be adjusted. Travellers from Perth or Brisbane who are not used to Hokkaido winters should also note that the trip from the airport involves a transfer at Otaru or a direct train, and the restaurants are closed on most Mondays, so plan the ramen night around the calendar rather than the weather.
When you are ready to lock in your trip, browse the menus and opening details for both restaurants, check the seasonal calendar to see what will be on the counter when you arrive, and book a Sapporo stay that puts you within a short tram ride of either shop. A bowl of Men-Eiji ramen is the kind of meal that changes how you think about Japanese food, and going in with a plan means you will taste it at its best.