Hayashi is tucked in a slightly forbidding area near Shibuya station, behind the Mark City complex and caught between the red-light district of Dogenzaka and the highway over Tamagawa-dori to the leafy suburbs of Setagaya.  This ten-person shop is the highest-rated ramen shop in the environs of Shibuya station, and serves a simplified menu of tonkotsu-gyokai and shio ramen.  I elected to go with the former as that’s what the shop is most known for, and at this point of my ramen-eating I was finally starting to come around on tonkotsu-gyokai.

 

The tonkotsu-gyokai broth was very smooth and relatively light for this particular style. While the seafood taste is pronounced, Hayashi’s version has none of the heavy thickness and/or gritty leavings from the fish stock that often appears in ramen of this style.  Were it not for the seafood flavor, one could mistaken it for a tonkotsu-shoyu bowl due to its color and texture.

 

The smooth broth is the highlight of this bowl. As for the noodles, chashu, and ajitama, they all range from average to slightly above average.  The noodles in particular are pretty average: eggy and overly round, like the spaghetti my father used to churn out in his pastamaker.  That said, one does get 190g of noodles with a regular order, rather than the standard 140-150g of other shps.  The yuzu peel in the broth is a nice decorative touch, but I’m not sure it makes any discernible difference in flavor for this bowl.