Ivan Ramen is a Japanese ramen

Ramen

is a Japanese noodle dish. It consists of Chinese-style wheat noodles served in a meat- or fish-based broth, often flavored with soy sauce or miso, and uses toppings such as , , kamaboko, green onions, and occasionally corn...

noodle restaurant in Setagaya, Tokyo

Setagaya, Tokyo

is one of the 23 special wards of Tokyo in Japan. It is also the name of a neighborhood within the ward. The ward calls itself the City of Setagaya in English...

, which is run by American chef Ivan Orkin. The restaurant opened in June 2006.

Owner Ivan Orkin was born in Syosset, New York

Syosset, New York

Syosset is a hamlet in Nassau County, New York, in the northeastern section of Town of Oyster Bay near the North Shore of Long Island. The population was 18,829 at the 2010 census...

, and moved to Japan in the 1980s to teach English after graduating from university. In 1990, he returned to the United States with his Japanese wife, Tamie, and attended the Culinary Institute of America from 1991 to 1993. He subsequently worked as a chef in New York at the Mesa Grill and Lutèce

Lutèce (restaurant)

Lutèce was a famed French restaurant in Manhattan that operated for more than 40 years before closing in 2004. It once had a satellite restaurant on the Las Vegas Strip....

. His wife Tamie died in 1998, and Orkin met his second wife, Mari, on a subsequent trip to Japan. They moved to Japan together in 2003.