Audrey and I walked into a ramen shop in Hakodate wanting two different bowls, a salt ramen and a butter-and-corn one, and came away from the ticket machine with tickets for two salt ramens. I can’t tell you which button did it. The mistake cost us nothing, and the lunch was good, which is the only reason this is a funny story instead of a sulky one. I can only vouch for one machine in one shop, so read what follows as a pattern to check against whatever you’re standing in front of, not as a rule.
What a Ramen Ticket Machine Asks You to Do
At casual ramen shops you’ll often find the machine just inside the door, and the routine it sets up is simple: buy a meal ticket first, hand it to the staff, and sit where they point you. The ticket is your order. That suits anyone who speaks no Japanese, because nobody has to take your order aloud, but it also means the whole decision happens in front of a screen before a person has any chance to catch a mistake.
– Salt ramen with broiled pork
– Plain salt ramen
– Gyoza
The standard advice adds a rule about payment. Older button machines want cash before the buttons light up, while newer touchscreens generally let you browse and choose first and take payment at the end. Ours was a touchscreen, and somewhere in the middle of our fumbling we learned that it wanted the cash first anyway. “Oh yeah, you have to put your cash in first, I get it” is more or less how that discovery went. I don’t know whether that’s a quirk of that model or of how the shop had it set up, but it means “generally” is doing real work in the advice.
Once we knew where to look, the machine itself was friendly enough. There were separate slots for bills and coins, a cancel button beside them, a ticket outlet low on the front and a separate tray for change. The screen had an English option, which we used, though I wouldn’t assume one will be there. Ours also offered Korean and two kinds of Chinese. We paid in cash. Whether that machine takes cards now, I don’t know, and some ramen-shop machines won’t, so it’s worth carrying yen.
How the Menu Is Built: Bowls, Sets and Toppings
What looks like a short menu is really three decisions stacked on top of one another. The first is the bowl. Ours had a plain salt ramen and, at the top of the screen, the Yondaime salt ramen with broiled pork, which the machine had marked “No. 1.” The second is the set. Each bowl appeared as several tiles, on its own, with gyoza, or with gyoza and a small rice, and the photographs looked almost identical from one tile to the next, so the price is the quickest way to tell which one you’re pointing at. On our screen the plain salt ramen was ¥700 alone, ¥920 with gyoza and ¥970 with rice added, while the broiled-pork bowl ran ¥1,030 with gyoza and ¥1,080 with rice. The third decision is toppings, which sat in a separate row along the bottom: egg, bamboo shoots, corn and butter at ¥120 each, roast pork at ¥200 and broiled pork at ¥300. Those are prices from our visit, not a current menu.
We took the middle rung of the set ladder because we had more eating planned that day, so we each got a bowl and three gyoza and no rice. I had the Yondaime salt ramen with broiled pork, and Audrey had the plain salt ramen in a clear chicken broth. At those prices that comes to about ¥2,000 for the two of us, and the ramen alone would have been a couple of hundred yen cheaper. A tile that looks like “the ramen” may really be “the ramen plus gyoza,” and the photograph won’t tell you which. On our screen the toppings weren’t on the bowl’s tile at all.
What Went Wrong at Our Machine
We wanted a salt ramen and a butter-and-corn one. Both were northern specialities as far as we understood, and it was our first time in the north of Japan and, as far as we remembered, our first time trying either. So we stood there working out the sets and where the money went, and somewhere along the way we ordered the wrong ramen. The corn and butter we’d come for never made it onto a ticket.
I wish I could give you the button. I can’t, and I don’t remember whether we realised at the machine or only when the bowls arrived. I think at one point we went back a screen to choose again, which is as likely a culprit as any, but that’s a suspect, not a finding. Butter and corn were on our screen as add-ons in that bottom row, so a salt ramen plus two toppings would have been one route to the bowl we wanted, and I don’t know whether we missed that row or were hunting for a bowl with them already built in.
My best guess is that there wasn’t one dumb press. There were a lot of tiles, several of them near-identical, and a machine that wanted its money before we’d made up our minds, and that combination is easy to get wrong.
What to Do When You Get It Wrong
The standard advice is cheap to follow. Before you’ve paid, use cancel or go back. Ours had a cancel button beside the money slots and a back-to-start button on the screen, which is the painless way to undo a pick. After you’ve paid, don’t buy a second ticket to patch the first. Take the ticket to a staff member and say something like “sumimasen, machigaemashita” (“sorry, I made a mistake”) before the kitchen starts cooking, since once a bowl is underway a shop may not be able to change it. That’s general advice, not a promise. I don’t know whether the shop would have swapped a ticket, because we ate what arrived.
We couldn’t read the sign well enough to know the shop’s name or whether it was a chain or a family place, and we’d gone in because of the pictures of ramen bowls on the walls. The name turns out to be Yondaime, and it’s a short walk from Hakodate Station. Our expertise in that room was one machine, one afternoon and a lot of pointing.
If you’d rather not decode anything alone, one current Hakodate option is a morning-market tour where the guide helps with recommendations and ordering while you eat. It’s a seafood tour, not a ramen one, and I haven’t taken it, so it won’t teach you how a ramen machine works, but it does take the ordering off your hands for a meal. You can see current times and options for the Hakodate Morning Market tour.
Was the Wrong Order the Right Lunch?
Yes, as it turned out. I had the Yondaime salt ramen with broiled pork, the bowl the machine marked No. 1, and Audrey was still happy with her plain salt ramen. We both thought it was very good ramen, and for a full set with gyoza the value was excellent. We left full.
The advice I’d give is dull but cheap: read the whole screen, rows and all, before any money goes in, and find the cancel button before you need it. The usual routine of paying, collecting the ticket and handing it over is a good default, but ours departed from the advice in at least one way, so check the machine in front of you. I still don’t know which button we got wrong, but it cost us nothing, and the lunch was good.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you order ramen from a ticket machine?
At casual ramen shops you’ll often find the machine just inside the door. You buy a meal ticket there, hand it to the staff, and sit where they point you, and the ticket is your order.
Do you pay before or after choosing at a ramen ticket machine?
The usual advice is that older button machines want cash before the buttons light up, while newer touchscreens let you choose first and pay at the end. Ours was a touchscreen that wanted the cash first anyway, so check the machine in front of you.
How is a ramen ticket machine menu laid out?
Ours stacked three decisions on one screen: the bowl, the set, and the toppings. Each bowl appeared as several tiles, on its own, with gyoza, or with gyoza and a small rice, and the photographs looked almost identical, so the price was the quickest way to tell them apart. Toppings sat in a separate row along the bottom.
Does a ramen ticket machine have an English option?
Ours did, along with Korean and two kinds of Chinese, and we used the English one. I wouldn’t assume every machine has one.
Can you pay by card at a ramen ticket machine?
We paid in cash, and I don’t know whether that machine takes cards now. Some ramen-shop machines won’t, so it’s worth carrying yen.
What should you do if you order the wrong ramen?
Before you’ve paid, use cancel or go back. After you’ve paid, take the ticket to a staff member and say something like “sumimasen, machigaemashita” before the kitchen starts cooking, since a shop may not be able to change a bowl once it’s underway. That’s general advice, not a promise, and we never asked, so I can’t say what the shop would have done.
What went wrong at our ticket machine?
We wanted a salt ramen and a butter-and-corn one and ended up with tickets for two salt ramens. I can’t tell you which button did it. We may have gone back a screen at one point, and butter and corn were on our screen as add-ons in a separate row, but that’s a suspect, not a finding.
This guide is also available in Spanish. [Leé la versión en castellano: Cómo pedir ramen en una máquina de tickets en Japón: qué nos salió mal]
This article contains affiliate links. If you book through one of these links, I may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.