Menya Hosaki is the passionate exploration of Eric Yoo’s love for ramen, family and community
/We first met up with Eric Yoo in March 2019, back when the world didn’t know about Covid-19, and the idea of opening a new restaurant was nerve-wracking for completely different reasons. Now, over a year later Eric is getting ready to open his new ramen restaurant, Menya Hosaki, on Upshur Street. His passion for ramen, his description of the menu and his deep-seated reasons for upending his life to open a ramen restaurant sounds like Petworth’s latest Asian restaurant is going to be amazing.
Eric comes from a restaurant family, with parents who have owned take-out restaurants and delis in Baltimore for years. He spent his youth working with his family before taking a different career path and goals. After years working as a consultant and reaching his early goals, Eric realized he wasn’t happy. What did make him happy was his passion for Japanese ramen noodles.
He decided to make a life change, give up consulting and make a go at being a restaurateur. He leased the space at 845 Upshur Street NW last year and began the process of remodeling the space as the building itself was being rebuilt as an apartment complex by the owner.
Eric on Upshur street outside the still-under-construction restaurant in 2019.
Eric was planning on working as a consultant right up until the Upshur restaurant opened, but as construction continued, Eric decided to focus purely on the food, and quit his lucrative consulting job. In July of 2019, he and a few friends opened a pop-up ramen restaurant in his father’s Annapolis deli to see if his concept would work.
“It was crazy, it was a lot of work,” Eric said. “And it was an amazing experience. It taught me so much about what was possible.”
Every Wednesday, Thursday and Friday evening, Eric would come in after the deli closed and would reorganize the kitchen to make it perfect for handmade ramen noodles, soups, sauces and meats. The pop-up shaped how he thought about running the Petworth restaurant. “I wouldn't have been ready if it wasn't for this popup,” he said.
He planned on it being a sit-down concept inside the deli, but after being open for a few months, Covid arrived and plans changed. “When I was running the popup, I was not planning on doing takeout. Ramen is best enjoyed in the house, but Covid forced us to be creative and come up with ways to make the ramen experience similar indoors. We experimented and got it pretty darn close,” Eric said.
The plan is to open the doors of Menya Hosaki to the public on September 9th, with a soft opening for friends and family the week before. (The name, roughly translated from Japanese, means “noodle shop bamboo shoot,” a play-on-words of Eric's middle name, and a reference to his tall, thin frame, resembling Hosaki-style bamboo shoots.)
Eric originally planned to open in August, but a death in the family put plans on hold as the family came together to grieve and heal. While the family is working on both, Eric and his wife felt it was time to open the ramen restaurant and move forward with the concept.
There will be no inside dining when the restaurant opens, but they will be serving 1 to 2 tables out on the front patio, and four tables in the rear patio (with proper social distancing). Different from what was originally planned, Eric says they will also focus on take-out meals (ordering through their website, UberEats and others).
The take-out menu will be a full experience with many items. Eric and his team crafted ways to keep the ramen as perfect as possible for people to pick up (or order delivery) and eat at their own homes.
Some of the meals will only be served at the restaurant. For example, Eric said that Mezesoba has to be served immediately. He describes it as a “brothless ramen pasta made up of saucy noodles, then you break an egg yolk on top, and sauce it up. It can't be served to go, it’s just not the same experience. We don't want to do it halfway.”
“Take out is going to be a little different than we planned,” Eric said, “and it will be different than what we serve at the restaurant, since there are a few menu items can only be served onsite due to how they’re made.”
Menya Hosaki is a very personal experience for Eric, and he wants the neighborhood to connect to and learn about his passion for ramen.
“I want to get to know the local community, and have them see what I can do as well,” he said. “This restaurant is a grand inspiration for me. I want people to know that I bring integrity and honesty to the food I make. If every component isn't made by me, I can't call it my ramen. Everything, from the noodles we make ourselves to every drop of soup you drink, will be from us. This is my dish, it has my name on it... I want everyone tasting something made in-house. I want people to understand the depth of it,” he said. “It’s a very natural food. No MSG or anything like that. We take huge pride in it.”
“I want the story of ramen and the food to shine,” he said. “I quit my consulting job and quit everything I did because I wanted to serve people. In a way it’s a Christian approach for my worldview, but it’s about having a family in the kitchen where I can help my neighbors, and be in a community where I can make friends and be a family. Petworth is perfect for that.”
There is a cultural component to how ramen is eaten in Japan that is different here in the US. Eric is aware of that, which is why he’s created a children’s menu for the restaurant, something a traditional ramen restaurant in Japan wouldn’t have.
“I want to cater to the community, but at the same time want to introduce ramen knowing I can't satisfy everyone. Originally I wasn't planning on adding a children's menu — in Japan, the kids eat the same bowls, just crushing the great ramen bowls, until they’re full.” He laughs and said, “I would love to see kids here crushing our bowls.”
He said that for the children's menu, it’s as simple as controlling the amount. “Our ramen is so natural, there’s no harsh components. It is what adults would get, just downsized for the kids and not spicy. We want families to be comfortable.”
Eric said he recognizes that opening a new restaurant during Covid is hard. “It’s crazy times,” he said. “It was a hard decision for me to decide what to do. But for us coming in, we're trying 100% best to keep our operation safe. It's something that we needed to do.”
After traveling the world, working as a ramen chef in New York City for his mentor Keizo Shimamoto and running the successful pop-up in Annapolis, Eric is feeling inspired and ready to open up in Petworth.
Don’t expect to see any signs out front of the restaurant announcing its presence. In Japan, ramen restaurants put out a few lanterns, open a curtain, and that’s how people know they’re open.
“In Japan, every morning people will put lanterns out as a sign they're open, and a lot of these shops don't have signage. I’m thinking right now it’ll be the same for Menya Hosaki.“
Eric said he plans to only put out a lantern to show the restaurant is open.
That said, Eric said the hours they’re planning on will be Tuesday through Saturday. (Tuesday through Thursday, 11am - 3pm, then reopen at 5:30 until 9pm for dinner. They’ll close later on Friday and Saturdays. Menus below… can’t wait to try it.
Menya Hosaki
845 Upshur St NW
menyahosaki.com
Instagram.com/menyahosaki
8/20: Article updated with new details
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