New udon restaurant: Tsuku Tsuku Tei

Photo by Martha Cheng

Kake udon at Tsuku Tsuku Tei

Honolulu has a number of udon joints; we tried out the newest of the batch, Tsuku Tsuku Tei, which entered the arena about a month ago. The chefs here make the udon fresh daily and they time each drop of the udon into boiling water, ensuring a chewy noodle. The pirikara zaru zaru udon ($6.75) is a chilled udon that comes with an excellent spicy shoyu and sesame dipping sauce while the dashi-based broth for the hot kake udon ($6.50) is light and subtle. We’d definitely come back for the udon, but probably not the tempura, which has a slightly doughy batter that comes out more soggy than crisp. The menu is spare, succeeding in its do-one-thing-and-do-it-well philosophy.

While on the topic of udon, anyone else miss GoShiGo, which closed last year? Now where do we go for natto udon or to watch handsome surfer chef Hidetaka Ushiki roll and cut the dough for noodles in the front window?

Tsuku Tsuku Tei, 641 Keeaumoku St, 946-6147