Best Little Noodle Bar in Tokyo

My eight day stay in Japan may not be long enough to discover good noodles.  Currently my list ranges from rubbery convenience store soba in Osaka, to mushy gelatinous udon in rural Kyoto.  

So when I arrive in Tokyo, a city of over 12 million people, who eat noodles for breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks in between, I have high expectations.  Surely the odds of finding good noodles are with me? 

On my first evening, after sight-seeing in the district of Shibuya, I duck down a side alley and into the first noodle bar I find.  When my order arrives I’m faced with a greasy soup of undercooked udon (thick wheat noodles), fatty chicken and floating burnt cabbage.  The empty booths, desperate waitress and bar’s outlook onto naked neon women were a warning but not one I heeded. 

Local tip offs are a godsend in this kind of situation.  According to a restaurant owner near my hotel, the best noodle bar in Tokyo can be found in the Ginza district. It is called Sakata.   The name acts like a drumming mantra all day on my sorry palate,  ‘Sakata, Sakata, Sakata’.  For someone unwilling to eat below par noodles ever again, it’s an irresistible beat. 

Night time in Tokyo

But Sakata is a well kept secret. 

At 7pm, as per the restaurant owner’s instructions, I catch the Yūrakuchō line to Ginza-itchōme station and exit through gate 4.  An hour and a half later I can feel the streets of fashionable Ginza through the soles of my shoes.

After three different sets of directions, I’m still none the wiser as to Sakata’s location.