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To get to Umai, you need a little faith. Turn down a street that doesn't look like a street, and behind the Hazel Room and Red Velvet Parlour, facing a wall with quotes about murder, you'll find a tiny food-cart pod tucked away like an oyster's pearl in a slab of dead-end pavement. Nothing could survive here unless it was either wonderful or desperate.
Well, it's wonderful, much like the Bundy's boiled-bagel cart next to it. Never mind that Umai has some of the best fried chicken in town, at a criminally low cost. Chicken karaage—the Japanese take on an American mid-South staple—is breaded just to the point of crispness and coated in soy, garlic and ginger, lightly sauced in chopsticks-ready chunks, and almost perfect for a mere $4. The kale and kelp salad ($3.50) is a lightly vinegared love affair with all things green by land or sea, with bright and deep flavors.
But you haven't gone
down this rabbit hole for kelp. Umai serves terrific ramen ($10), with a
shoyu broth that wallops you with soy, and a shio (salt) broth that
mixes with the natural saltiness of the soup's tender pulled pork
shoulder to create a sort of light-headed ecstasy amid probable brain
dehydration. But the real depth of flavor is provided by pickled
shiitakes, a just-so soft-boiled egg and a mess of scallions and steamed
greens, not to mention al dente, cart-made noodles with taste and
texture that announce themselves rather than recede into glutenous
limpness. The broths and meat are not tenderly smoky like Shigezo's or
Mirakutei's, nor do they reach the muscle-relaxant umami high of Yuzu's
tonkotsu. But by the end of each bowl of shio, the only thing you'll
want is more of the same.
- Order this: Shio ramen, but (pro tip) try the veggie broth with karaage dunked in. Damn.
- Best deal: That fried chicken is $4.
EAT: Umai, Southeast 33rd Avenue and Hawthorne Boulevard, 502-4428, umaipdx.com. Noon-5 pm Wednesday-Sunday.
WWeek 2015