Brisbane’s best-known ramen chef has launched a classy izakaya
Come for “posh” edamame, wagyu garlic steak and sous vide chicken liver sashimi. There’s also a refreshed drinks menu – and, yes, you can still order noodle soup.
A man can’t survive on ramen alone. Not any more, anyway.
Taro’s Ramen has for years been the yardstick by which any other Japanese noodle soup in this city is measured. And much of that success is down to the passion of owner Taro Akimoto. When Akimoto opened Taro’s in the old Boeing House building on Adelaide Street in 2010, he wasn’t a chef. He wasn’t even a cook. He was simply a lapsed salaryman chasing a love for tasteful noods.
It’s curious, then, to hear Akimoto talk in 2024 about wanting to take his cooking beyond ramen. But it’s not that he’s fallen out of love with it, he says.
“When we opened Taro’s Ramen, I was in my mid-30s with an appetite for rich foods,” Akimoto explains. “Heavy, oily stuff. Tonkotsu ramen was my big craving that I wanted to share with Brisbane. I’m 48 now and my appetite has gotten leaner and my appreciation for things other than ramen has grown.”
Earlier this month, Akimoto launched Taro’s Izakaya. Seven nights a week it’s taking over Taro’s Ramen’s CBD shop, preparing a seasonal selection of Japanese small plates (the shop is opening as usual for ramen during the day).
The menu includes “posh” edamame with truffle mayo and parmesan, wagyu garlic steak, sous vide chicken liver sashimi with garlic soy, kimchi tofu and yaki onigiri with Yarra Valley salmon caviar.
There’s also a menu of rotating specials such as Rocky Point grouper karaage, house-made chicken jerky with shichimi mayo, and a 63-degree Forage Farms egg with Japanese herbs.
There’s a lot of good Japanese food in this town these days, but it tends to be split between higher-end omakase and kaiseke joints on the one hand, and simpler sushi or ramen spots on the other. Akimoto reckons there aren’t so many izakayas – traditionally casual Japanese restaurants in which diners settle in and socialise over a range of food and drinks – at least not at an affordable price point like the places he frequents on trips home to Japan.
“The customer’s in charge,” Akimoto says. “The customer chooses from a lot of things on the menu. So I can go with my partner, I can go with my kids, they will have something that pleases everyone … you’re not expecting gold leaf on the food or intricate plating. But the quality is there, and the seasons are there. And that’s sort of what Brisbane is missing, I think.”
It might sound like a significant shift for Akimoto, but beyond its ramen, Taro’s secret weapon has always been some exceptional smaller plates such as house-made pan-fried pork gyoza with “wings” and curry dusted karaage. And Akimoto had an opportunity to test his concept with a Sapporo-sponsored izakaya at Brisbane Powerhouse’s Nightfeast in October.
“Sapporo really wanted to showcase their beer with food that matched,” Akimoto says. “That was the opportunity that was given to me. It went well and I really enjoyed it.”
Yes, noodle soup has already popped up on the izakaya’s specials menu in the form of a fancy duck shoyu ramen. And Taro’s ramen menu is still available for diners who want to keep it old school.
For drinks, Taro’s Ramen CBD is adding to its usual selection of beer, wine, plum wine and sake with a list of whisky highballs, shochu and chuhai (shochu highballs).
“The other component of this is the external factors,” Akimoto says. “Competition in ramen is a lot better and more diverse now, and the city location isn’t as busy during dinner time compared with pre-COVID. So it’s been good to create more of a destination restaurant.”
Open Mon-Fri 11.30am-2pm (ramen only), 5.30pm-8pm; Sat-Sun noon-2pm (ramen only), 5.30pm-8pm
Level 2, 480 Queen Street, Brisbane
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Matt Shea is Food and Culture Editor at Brisbane Times. He is a former editor and editor-at-large at Broadsheet Brisbane, and has written for Escape, Qantas Magazine, the Guardian, Jetstar Magazine and SilverKris, among many others.