Zen and the art of noodle making and ripening the perfect berries.
It took until my own father’s funeral to realise that he had always been my greatest friend. You see, when it's done right, there is nothing more powerful than the love between a parent and their children. As Tolstoy wrote in Anna Karenina “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
All of these thoughts passed through my mind as I stood by the stairs down a narrow passageway leading to the outdoor dining area of Ponsonby’s ‘Ramen Takara’. I was standing alongside inspirational owner/chef Yuki Yamaguchi as we surveyed a collection of small print photos on the wall. A number of the prints portrayed Yuki at various stages of life with her beloved father - Nobuyuki. The prints show Yuki’s chef father standing unflinchingly by her side as he supports her in the first few months of setting up her restaurant.
You see, Yuki was born on the slopes of Mt Fuji. Her own father in his early childhood had discovered ramen and fallen in love with this soupy, noodly, national dish of Japan. It inspired him to become a ramen chef and in turn inspired Yuki to follow in his footsteps.
This journey brought Yuki to New Zealand where she set up her first Ramen Takara restaurant in Browns Bay 16 years ago, and then on Ponsonby Road 8 Years ago. Yuki has many secrets that makes her ramen so delicious, but for me the factor I love most is the ‘close to perfection’ consistency and taste of her freshly made noodles. You can see the clinical precision, the obsession with the smallest details, the artistic perfection in every dish and every noodle.
These qualities are synonymous with Japanese traits and also abound in one of my favourite Marlborough producers - Takaki Okada of Folium Vineyard. Takaki lives almost in solitary on his small dry farmed and organic vineyard in the Brancott Basin. The vines are his friends and he tends to them daily, seeking to understand each and every contour of his vineyard in his endeavour to make the greatest wines. His goal; to attain the singular most pure expression of his terroir is his neverending life’s pursuit. Both Yuki and Takaki manage to display an incredible serenity in their character and approach while remaining so incredibly industrious in their work; a lesson to us all - wise eyes, gentle smiles, tough hands.
As such, it feels like an honour to pair these two delights together. Yuki’s Tan Tan Ramen is without doubt the signature dish at Ramen Takara. The dish has its roots back in China but came across to Japan in its ramen form in the early 20th Century. A rich sour and spicy sesame base with pork mince to make a rich dark red soup, the bok choy and shredded leek offering vital green colours and crunch. With such a brooding dish it has to be pinot noir. The 2018 from Folium Vineyard is the only choice. The wine displays a singularity along the palate - a linear shape from opening flavour, through secondary characters of light mushroom and earth with a lingering finish and the most supple, delicious ‘rolling sublimely and visceral over your tongue’ tannins, which I tend to find connects the greatest pinot noir from Waipara through to Blenheim. This is a wine to be savoured, you cannot rush to your next mouthful of food, some zen needs to be applied in the pace of your meal for full sensory impact! (Puneet Dhall)
@puneetofponsonby www.dnfinewine.co.nz