My friend N and I are fellow foodie sisters, so it is no surprise that our adventures often lead us to great food. This time around when I went to visit her in Boston, N picked Yume Ga Arukara and we made our way there on Friday night.
Yume Ga Arukara is the sister restaurant of the famous Yume Wo Katare, and like its famous sister who specializes in pork ramens, Yume Ga Arukara only serves a single dish: niku udon, or udon noodles with beef. You can get the dish served hot or cold, with extra noodles or extra beef. It is located inside what looks to be an indistinguishable administrative building of Lesley University. Once inside the building, find it by following the constantly trailing line of waiting diners by the two level noodle bar, sitting elbow to elbow and slurping up their noodles. They only serve 100 bowls per day, Tokyo salary man restaurant flash backs for real.
The owner of these establishments like to call these spaces workshops, as opposed to restaurants and interestingly it is also a workshop in philosophy.
The ramen shop Yume Wo Katare translates to “speak your dreams” and after you finish your meal, the team encourages you to stand up and declare your goals and ambitions in front of diners eating alongside you. It is meant to be an active, loud, outwardly supportive experience.
Parallelly, the beef udon established Yume Ga Arukara that we visited is focused more on introspection. The team encourages diners to be inspired by their udon dish and think about their motivations and goals as they eat. Aptly, Yume Ga Arukara translates to “because I have a dream.” If you feel like it, there is also open invitation to stand up and declare your intentions here as well but only if you so desire.
About 10 minutes of wait in line and we tottered up the extremely high bar seats looking over the cooking process. We both opted for the cold version, and was soon served bowls of perfectly crafted udon, with a side of shaved, deliciously flavored beef, on a bed of the perfect amount of delicate broth, topped with scallion, seaweed, shaved daikon and a piece of lemon. We ate it all, yes including the lemon rind and all, and as they do for all diners, the team hailed that we have done such a good job finishing our meal. A Perfect! they said, but honestly the the credit truly all goes to the team for perfecting a simple bowl of food into a masterpiece.
They currently only have restaurants in Boston and Tokyo, so I spent the last 10 minutes of our stay trying to convince the marketing manager that NYC should be the next move. I can only hope I it worked, but I am also happy for this to be a hidden gem that people make a Boston pilgrimage for. It is worth it.
I spent the last 10 minutes of our stay trying to convince the marketing manager that NYC should be the next move. I can only hope I it worked 🏽.