Sure, there’s no shortage of ramen joints in Sydney, but this fresh arrival at the Star is the only one where Wagyu beef takes centre stage. This premium Ozaki beef is sourced from a single farm in Miyazaki Prefecture, and given Mashi No Mashi is brought to us by the team behind Tokyo’s legendary Wagyumafia, you can be sure these hand-picked cuts are worthy of dominating an entire menu.
It’s the hero of all five signature ramens, showcased in a variety of forms. There’s the tokusei tsukemen, the house speciality, which instead of soup, comes paired with a thick, umami-laden, collagen-rich beef broth for dipping your noods. Spice it up with a ‘samurai bomb’ made from a togarashi-infused ball of beef fat if you dare.
But if soup is what you seek, the Wagyujiro features a silken Ozaki beef-bone broth that’s imported from Japan for maximum authenticity. The house noodles are a gloriously thick, dense udon cut, the perfect landing pad for thick slices of eight-hour stewed Wagyu that celebrates this meat’s melt-in-the-mouth marbling.
The sides are also a bovine bonanza, including a Wagyu variant of that most faithful of ramen sidekicks, the pan-fried gyoza, and there’s even a slight detour to neighbouring China, courtesy of Wagyu char siu bao, dressed with mushroom jam and a tinge of wasabi to bring us back to the land of the rising sun. You can wash it all down with Mashi No Mashi’s very own canned Highballs – a wink to Japan’s love affair with whisky.
The cute 50-seater restaurant is colourful and laid back, even if the menu items don’t have quite the price tag you’d associate with a diner with a fast-casual vibe – expect to fork out $38-$48 for your noodle fix. But c’mon people, this is Wagyu we’re talking about. Sometimes, you get what you pay for, and at Mashi No Mashi, that’s a damn good thing.
