A. Scattergood

tsukemen and matcha tea at Tsujita Annex

Sometimes the ramen gods hear you, don't they. Tsujita Annex, the little ivy-covered outpost of the larger Tsujita L.A. ramen palace across Sawtelle Boulevard, opened recently serving big bowls of tonkotsu ramen and not too much else. The lunchtime bowls of tsukemen, or dip ramen, were the province of the larger restaurant, which has had long lines pretty much since it opened as crowds gathered for bowls of the stuff. But a few days ago, tsukemen showed up on the menu of the Annex, for which some of us are unreasonably grateful.

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Clarissa Wei

Bukkake udon from Tsurumaru

While Japanese noodle fanatics have been gawking over artisanal ramen joints, another type of noodle business has been growing, albeit at a much quieter pace, within Los Angeles. The noodle of choice? Handmade udon.

According to Yoko Isassi, a Japanese cooking instructor in Los Angeles, the composition of udon is quite simple. The basic ingredients are wheat flour, water and salt. "There's typically a 13% gluten content," she says. "Every udon shop has their own specific type of mix."

There are two new handmade udon shops now open in Little Toyko, Marugame Monzo and Tsurumaru, both of which have opened within the last year. Although both restaurants craft udon from scratch, Tsurumaru specializes in Osaka-style udon, while the style of Monzo's noodles originated in the Kagawa Prefecture on Shikoku island.

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A. Scattergood

Ramen at Tsujita Annex

With the dollar-yen exchange rate so good right now, you may be reading this in a Tokyo tsukemen shop. Lucky you. But if you're still in L.A., you might consider heading over to Little Osaka, where the beautiful noodle palace of Tsujita L.A. has recently expanded across the street. Lucky us.

A few weeks ago, Tsujita Annex opened in the space that previously housed the short-lived ramen shop, Miyata Menji.

That Tsujita has expanded should come as no surprise to anyone who has spent time waiting outside the original shop at lunchtime, when long lines often snake down the street as the usual crowd waits for a table at which to consume tsukemen, the dip ramen in which the restaurant has specialized since its opening in 2011, which is served only at lunch.

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Anne Fishbein

Marinated silver cod at Tsujita

Our 99 Essential L.A. Restaurants issue came out recently, and we're highlighting a few categories drawing from the list. Today: Japanese restaurants.

This is not a definitive list of the best Japanese restaurants in L.A., but it is a sampling of five that we think are each essential in their own way.

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Erin Lyall

Shirako Nigiri at Hamasaku

There it sits on a plate, shiny and quivery and not unlike a pile of raw sweetbreads. Intertwining sacks, bound by sinew, filled with creamy sperm. Cod sperm, to be more exact. And I'm going to eat a lot of it. Without gagging. In fact, I'm going to enjoy it.

Hamasaku, a Japanese restaurant tucked in a strip mall near the 405, has long been a power-dinner, Hollywood-player kind of place, with dozens of elaborate sushi rolls named for the stars who created them. But two months ago a new sushi chef, Yoya Takahashi, arrived and things started to change. He's the spunky guy responsible for the sperm.

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C. Pete Lee

If you look up Mishima on the Internet, you may discover a wide variety of things: It's the name of a city, town and village in Japan; it's the surname of one of Japan's most important authors, Yukio Mishima (see also: seppuku); it's a musical group from Barcelona; and it's even a style of pottery. You may also find a packaged food company founded by Yukata Mishima that owns and operates a Los Angeles-based restaurant with the same name. Mishima, the restaurant, on 3rd St. near the corner of La Cienega Blvd., which opened in 1993, will close its doors on Feb. 4.

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Shako Liu

Fugetsu-Do Confectioners, a mochi shop in downtown Los Angeles, will celebrate its 110th anniversary this fall. The family-run sweet shop was founded by Seiichi Kito in 1903. In Japanese culture, mochi, a Japanese rice cake made of glutinous rice, is a favorite food for New Year's Day. Fugetsu-Do's current owner Brian Kito, Seiichi Kito's grandson, combines the tradition with a modern twist, adding colors and different fillings -- chocolate and peanut butter, for example -- to the hand-made rice cake recipe he inherited from his grandfather.

"We use pastries in funerals, showers, certain birthdays in the Japanese culture," Kito says. "We also use them for certain religious ceremonies and holidays -- New Year's Day is generally a day to eat mochi."

Recently we caught up with Kito to ask him about the upcoming anniversary. For the video, turn the page.

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Ikemen Ramen

Zebra Dip

Little Tokyo's array of ramen eateries attests to the dish's versatility -- and booming popularity. There's Daikokuya's rich pork broth. Shin-Sen-Gumi's thin, Hakata-style noodles. The blended soy-pork broth of Men Oh Tokushima. Orochon's super spicy "Special #2." Possibly two dozen types at Mr. Ramen. Plus the noodles at Japanese-Chinese diners Suehiro and Kouraku. Too bad Chin Ma Ya just closed, depriving us of chicken-pork broth infused with sesame paste.

Now, yet another variety has set up shop: Ikemen Ramen, opening today in Little Tokyo's Weller Court. (Hours are 11:30 a.m. to 11:30 p.m.) Ikemen may be new to Little Tokyo, but not L.A. -- it debuted in a Hollywood strip mall in fall 2011. The style? Just call it "Hollywood," says co-owner Max Kawabata. The menu -- and techniques behind it -- aim for innovation rather than tradition.

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E. Dwass

A new location of the popular Sugarfish sushi chain is under construction in Calabasas, expected to open this spring in upscale shopping center The Commons. Sugarfish was launched in 2008 by renowned chef Kazunori Nozawa, who ran Sushi Nozawa in Studio City from 1985 until the restaurant closed last year.

Nozawa, who has served up sushi for more than 50 years, trained with master chefs in Tokyo. He is legendary for his strict dining rules and for eschewing American-style sushi, including California rolls and fusion dishes. The Sugarfish website says he "concentrates on the purity of his basic ingredients -- nurturing relationships with the finest fish purveyors across the globe, cutting his fish with an artisan's painstaking care, and even making his own fresh soy sauce and ponzu."

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Flickr/Muy Yum

Kushiyaki skewers at Ozumo

Here's some news for fans of Santa Monica's Ozumo: Early next year, the sushi bar will be relocating from its space in Santa Monica Place to a beachside sort just east of the Pier, where it will "evolve" in a new Izakaya restaurant called Bamboo, run by much of the same management team and staff behind Ozumo, including chef Toshio Sakamaki .

But we haven't gotten to the best part: Bamboo's ordering system will revolve around "groundbreaking iPad technology," allowing guests to see images of the dishes, place orders, and provide "interactive experiences," which will "[teach] about the history of the Izakaya dining tradition." Just don't wipe your greasy fingers on the screen after consuming a few chicken skewers.

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