A ramen shop unlike any other in the Bay Area opens on the Peninsula

Brothless abura soba is the highlight and offers a world of toppings to customize bowls

The Peninsula has a new temple dedicated to a hard-tofind genre of ramen.

Kajiken, a popular chain in Japan known for abura soba, a brothless ramen style, recently opened its first California location at 112 S. B. St. in downtown San Mateo. The Bay Area is home to a flourishing ramen scene, but abura soba remains less common — and this is the region’s only restaurant devoted to the dish.

While classic ramen is all about the broth, abura soba is a saucy, customizable experience. Thick wheat noodles, made fresh in a glass-walled room next to the kitchen, are served coiled on top of different combinations of ingredients at the bottom of the bowl, like soy sauce, curry powder and chile oil. Employees are trained to remind diners to mix everything “immediately and thoroughly,” for at least 30 seconds, before diving in.

The topping possibilities are much more vast in the world of abura soba than typical ramen: without liquid, nothing runs the risk of getting soggy.

The restaurant offers nine bowls, with topping combinations like spicy minced pork and raw egg yolk, or lightly seared beef with crispy onions. There’s one vegan abura soba, made with shimeji and trumpet mushrooms, spinach and tofu.

Customers can order extra toppings like kimchi, cheese, chives and ajitama, a soy-sauce marinated egg. Kajiken will eventually allow diners to create their own bowls.

Timothy Lu, master franchisee for Kajiken in California, hopes customers will further personalize their ramen as they eat. Kajiken serves all toppings on the side, so they can add a few corn kernels to one bite, and then extra garlic and a few dashes of vinegar to the next.

“Every couple of bites, it’s evolving,” Lu said.

The menu also includes a few appetizers, such as karaage and takoyaki. For drinks, expect tea and soft drinks like ramune, the cult-favorite Japanese soda, to start; beer and sake will come later.

Kajiken’s minimalist but warm dining room, lit by hanging paper lanterns, has 43 seats, including four counter seats that look directly into the room where the noodle-making action happens. The restaurant will later add outdoor seating and takeout, but for now is focusing on the in-person experience. (The owners axed a plan for kiosk ordering so servers can be more hands-on, particularly for abura soba novices.)

Lu, who’s worked front-ofhouse jobs at popular Bay Area Japanese restaurants, became obsessed with Kajiken while studying abroad in Japan in 2011. The chain was born in Nagoya,

Japan in 2010, and has since grown to dozens of locations throughout Japan, Singapore and China. But Kajiken had no U.S. presence at the time, so Lu cold-messaged the company on Facebook and convinced it to come to California. Lu, who loves the restaurant so much he got its logo tattooed on his right wrist, is now Kajiken’s first-ever California franchise owner, and will help the company expand.

Kajiken. 11 a.m.-2 p.m. and 5-9 p.m. Wednesday-Monday. 112 S. B St., San Mateo. kajikenusa.com

Photos by Stephen Lam/The Chronicle Kajiken, a popular Japanese chain that specializes in brothless ramen, or abura soba, is opening its first California location in San Mateo.

Kajiken franchise owner Tim Lu mixes sauces for a bowl of abura soba at the San Mateo restaurant.

Customers can grind dried garlic onto their abura soba at Kajiken in San Mateo.

The dining room at Kajiken’s new San Mateo restaurant.