The story of how I went to Malatang for three days in a row.

I'm sure I'm late to the trend.

Because until recently,
I didn't know what Malatang was.

A video about
Malatang that I happened to see on YouTube
had 4 million views.

"Huh? Is it that popular? lol"

I felt a little nervous.
Especially... what was it?

That triangular
white and orange
striped food.

Is there something crunchy inside...?

"What does it taste like... I want to try it!"

I timidly
peeked into the store,
and through the glass, vegetables, meat, and glass noodles
were neatly lined up across the wall.

And, when I observed closely,
there were many young women (and some men too),
and everyone seemed to know the rules
and were being drawn in smoothly.

It was a bit of an otherworldly space.

It didn't seem like fast food,
nor a laid-back space.

Going alone
takes a bit of courage...

Thinking that, I forced my husband,
who wasn't interested at all, to go with me.

Malatang Yang Guo Fu.
It seems to be a popular chain with 7,000 stores worldwide.

Since it opens at 11:00,
when I went 10 minutes early on a weekday,
two women were already waiting in front.

By the time it hit 11:00,
about 10 people
had lined up behind us.

"Huh? Do this many people line up...
I wonder if I can pick the ingredients well... I'm nervous."

I had, at least,
studied the recommended ingredients on YouTube
many times,

so I picked the ingredients I liked.
It's sold by weight.
I chose the soup and noodles.

I understood that much.

But, when I was actually in front of it,
I had no idea what was going on. Haha.

There were so many things I didn't recognize
lined up, so my eyes were wandering everywhere.

I didn't know
what I should pick.

For now, I thought,

"I just need to make it look like a hot pot, right?"

With that housewife-like intuition,

I kept the portions very small
and tried picking a variety of things.

Stalk wakame seaweed and baby bamboo shoots. Tofu that looked like thin paper. Duck blood?
There was even something that looked like a chicken foot.

It was kind of amazing. It was China.

"That will be 1,380 yen."

A Chinese woman
handed me a receipt with a number 4 written on it
at lightning speed.

When I went up to the second floor, the interior was uniform, and I
wasn't sure where to sit. For now...
a seat for two. In the corner.

Since it's a popular shop,
I thought if two people sat at a four-person table,
we'd probably have to share it.

And as I suspected, that was the case.

Even if you put your bag down
to spread out at a four-person table,
the staff would say, 'Please clear this space~'

and come to organize the floor without hesitation.

I prepared a paper apron and some condiments I picked up in a separate dish
(something like sesame sauce and green onions),
grabbed a large soup spoon and chopsticks,

and waited, wondering when it would come.

"Number 4~ Number 4~"

It's a style where the staff brings it to you.

The bowl arrived sooner than I expected.

What was there
was the Malatang I had wanted to try at least once.

I was intimidated and chose mild (1).
Even though my husband warned me, 'It's supposed to be spicy!',
he didn't seem to listen and chose very spicy (4).

The soup I saw was cloudy.
Huh? Is it like this? It doesn't look spicy.

My husband's was bright red.

Time to eat.
When I took a bite,

"Hmm? Oh? This seems fine."

I was still doing fine.
My husband was sweating profusely.

Feeling like it wasn't enough,
I went to get some spicy sauce from a separate dish and added it.

Then...
I ended up adding more than I expected,
and because I got carried away,
it became incredibly spicy. lol

When I was a student,
I used to work part-time
at a Thai restaurant.

The spiciness is different from Chinese style,
but the staff meals were also spicy,
so I was actually pretty good with spice.

The Malatang soup
had the unique aroma of Sichuan peppercorns.
The spiciness and the numbing sensation matched perfectly,

Ah, this is going to be addictive.
I groaned to myself.

It's stimulating, spicy, and delicious.
What is this? The soup is so deep.

Again and again, ah, it really is delicious.
It really is delicious. Delicious!!!

It's the kind of thing you keep wanting to try again.
I think the fact that you can choose your own ingredients is also fun.

"Ah... I only took one of these this time."
"I'll definitely take this next time!"

While reviewing the ingredients I chose,
I'll make my "My Best Malatang"
next time for sure.
That kind of motivation wells up. lol

For noodles, I chose the corn noodles,
which are easy to eat and slightly sweet.
They were just right.

Other options included slightly chewy,
thicker beef bone noodles,
glass noodles, and what looked like homemade knife-cut noodles.

They all looked delicious.
It's also nice that you can choose a complimentary noodle.

In particular, my favorites were

white wood ear mushrooms, bunmoja, and
flat glass noodles.

Crunchy, chewy, and slippery.

The texture is interesting, and
since I don't usually eat it, I'm hooked.

That's what I thought.

As for when to swallow these...
I had no idea. lol

If this level of satisfaction
can be had for around 1,000 yen, I'm happy.

I want to come again.

Thinking that, I...

Believe it or not...

I ended up going for three days in a row.

(On the second day, I got greedy and
spent over 2,000 yen and couldn't finish it all)

With this, I have officially
become a woman who follows the trends. lol

Let's eat what we love.

Noka Shiraishi