Udon Mugizo is an udon restaurant in the Kinokinuya building in SF Japantown. They also have locations in San Jose and Mountain View. I’ve had a few bowls of udon here and they’ve all been pretty good.
Today I had a bowl of the kitsune udon ($15.75 for a regular sized bowl). Kitsune udon - “fox” udon - is a simple dish of udon noodles in a seasoned dashi based soup with inari age - a pocket of fried tofu seasoned with soy sauce, sugar, and mirin. I make this sometimes at home with frozen udon noodles and it was interesting to compare with the “real thing” This was a very good bowl of noodles. The dashi was quite strongly flavored. It was a bit salty so I didn’t polish off all of the broth. The house made udon had a very nice texture, springy and bouncy. The inari age was in one big piece and was quite substantial.
On a prior visit, I had a bowl of the katsu curry udon ($23.50 for a regular sized bowl). This had a soup with a beefy curry sauce with some pieces of beef. The tonkatsu pork cutlet was served on the side so as to not become soggy in the soup. It was nicely fried but a little underseasoned.
Maybe I will go again some time. During COVID when there was no dine in I got burned by the Mountain View location. Ordered three bowls. Gave me a bag with only two bowls. Didn’t realize that and went home. Called them up and told them about it and asked them to take the third bowl off the bill. They told me to come back here and pick up the third bowl. I didn’t want to spend another 40 minutes to fix their mistakes. It took some back and forth before they finally agreed.
And I didn’t enjoy the two bowls so much. Perhaps I ordered the wrong thing. It felt like ramen substituted with udon at the time. I should probably have gotten what you got.
This is my go-to restaurant in Japantown. I end up here with friends with kids as it is pretty kid friendly too (at least Japanese kid friendly). The kitsune udon is my go-to. I know they have a ramen broth style udon, but I agree that doesn’t make as much sense. I love the bonito-ness of the broth.
The combo’s with either rice bowls and a mini udon or the tempura + mini udon are a good deal.
And yes, getting it to go one time wasn’t quite the same. I just don’t think hot broths from plastic containers taste quite the same.
I just went to their Mountain View location. They offer cold udon, which was perfect for the hot weather. The noodles were yummy and the portions were huge. Will be back to try more items.
This was a very good bowl of noodles. The dashi was quite strongly flavored. It was a bit salty so I didn’t polish off all of the broth. The house made udon had a very nice texture, springy and bouncy. The inari age was in one big piece and was quite substantial.
