Date Night | Tajima Restaurant

You don’t have to be a starving student to love ramen…especially if it’s from Tajima Restaurante!

Daddy and I discovered Tajima Restaurant one day when I was craving ramen noodles. I wasn’t quite sure of what I wanted, but I knew what I did not want. We’ve been to Choptix before, we’ve had Pho one too many times, a friend had recommended a ramen place to me but I didn’t like it. I wanted something close to the Top Ramen we are all familiar with, but with flair. I just love the consistency of the noodles – hearty, chewy and just plain fulfilling. For years I had been on a search for the best ramen noodles in town, and by George, I found it!

One day, about a year ago, as we were scavenging the streets of San Diego for a date night spot, I did a quick search on yelp for “ramen noodles” and Tajima Restaurant popped up! I immediately was interested in visiting the place after reading the reviews, and noting they had 4 out of 5 stars. The line out the door further confirmed we had hit the jackpot. Ever since then, Tajima Restaurant has become one of our frequent date night spots.

Here’s what we always order:

Appetizer: #85. Squid Karaage. It’s basically a Japanese style calamari, and it’s served with lemon and a side of mayo topped with spicy seasoning.  It’s delicious…sometimes I feel like I can eat the whole thing!

Mommy’s Ramen: #121. Kakuni Ramen. Pork Belly and egg. It sounds so bad, but it’s so good! The pork is sweet and the egg is salty making it the perfect blend. I always order this, with thin cut ramen noodles and the Tajima Original broth or soup flavor.

Daddy’s Ramen: He’s between #117. Extra BBQ Ramen. Extra BBQ pork and egg and #122. Spicy Ramen. BBQ pork, ground pork, and egg. Both are pretty good, and I’ve noticed depending on his mood he switches between these two soups.He also goes with the thin cut ramen noodles and the Tajima original soup flavor.

Other things to try: #102. Japanese Style Steak, #86. Gyoza, and #82. German Potato – Garlic french fries, onion and pork belly
on top! What can I say, I have a thing for pork bellies!

One thing is for sure…you won’t be disappointed and you’ll probably leave an empty bowl for your server to pick up!

Overall, we love this place for date night in San Diego! It’s consistent, it’s hip and they have a pretty cool happy hour menu. They have two locations in the same area. One on Mercury Road and the other on Convoy Street. We prefer the location on Mecury Road because it is a lot bigger than the one on Convoy. Parking is okay, you have a lager menu selection and you have a better chance of getting seated within the first 5-10 minutes of your arrival. The Convoy location is a bit more work, it’s smaller, you have to park farther, and so on…just go to the one on Mercury! We recently dined in to eat and write down some of our new goals. A great place for conversation…not too loud, not too quiet!

What’s one of your regular date night spots? Happy Date Night!

*Photos with comments courtesy of the Tajima Restaurant Menu