LIC Smash Hit Mu Ramen to Launch 11 Course Tasting Menu Next Month

Mu Ramen, the wildly popular five-month-old Long Island City restaurant, will launch a tasting menu later this month. Though Mu specializes in big bowls of tonkatsu ramen and other drinking foods like okonomiyaki and foie gras-stuffed chicken wings, the new addition shouldn't come as a complete surprise. Chef Joshua Smookler spent years cooking at Per Se before turning his attention to noodles, and as Ryan Sutton pointed out in his review of Mu, the price and the decor already show the restaurant's ambition.

Smookler tells Eater that his new tasting menu, which runs around 11 courses, will cost $145 per person, and only be served at chef's counter in the restaurant. He plans to debut it on May 22, and will only offer it on Friday and Saturday nights, with two seatings – one at 6 p.m. and one at 8:30 p.m. Wine pairings will be available, and unlike the rest of the restaurant, the Chef's Counter @ Mu Ramen (as its being called) will take reservations. More specifically, tickets to a meal must be purchased in advance, which can be done up to a month ahead of time be emailing tickets@muramen.com. Only parties of two, four, or six can be seated. The launch of the tasting menu also means a big change for anyone dining at the restaurant, even a la carte, because with its debut, Mu will cease to be cash-only.

No word yet on what the menu itself will look like, or if there will be any overlap with the regular Mu menu. Smookler has long been planning a dry aged beef tasting event, so perhaps we'll see some of that 165-day dry aged beef show up on the weekly tasting menu as well.