Ramen Lab (CLOSED)

New York is mighty serious about its noodles, with ramen counters cropping up from the Lower East Side (Ivan Ramen) to Long Island City (Mu Ramen). The latest to join the ranks is this 10-seat educational slurp shop from the Sun Noodle team, whose superior strands have been a secret weapon in noodle houses on both East and West Coasts—including NYC’s Momofuku Noodle Bar, Totto Ramen and Hide-Chan, among countless others—for three decades. During the day, the restaurant runs as a testing facility, opening its kitchen—by appointment only—to chefs looking to tweak recipes and master the art of the noodle. At night, the “lab” portion is evident in scientific details: beaker water glasses, ergonomic chopsticks with tornado-shape ridges for noodle-gripping and even an aluminum-lined ceramic bowl—designed by chef Shigetoshi Nakamura himself—to keep the soup as hot as possible. Take a seat at the blond-wood bar, where Nakamura layers bowls of miso and shoyu ramen with full-bodied xo and torigara broths, marinated pork belly and fresh toppings (minced scallion, bean sprouts, cabbage), and slings small plates like ginger-pork dumplings and pickled eggs.