Kintaro
Kintaro is my favorite place in Cusco for udon and has one of the best lunch menu deals in town.
For s/25 the lunch menu includes mugicha (roasted barley tea) with refills. You can choose between salad or miso soup as a starter. The main dish is a choice of thee kinds of udon or three kinds of don. Besides the tea, you can choose soft drinks, water, lemonade or pisco sour. The dessert is always a shot glass with some sort of ice cream or mousse. Though there are three dessert options on the menu, they just bring you whatever they have that day. I’ve been served a different flavor almost every time: mango, strawberry, blackberry, oreo and other fruit combinations that I couldn’t identify.
My most recent lunch at Kintaro was also the first time I’ve ever seen the restaurant full.
All eight tables, plus the couches set around a low table were full. This is a great sign for the recovery of tourism as we still try to get past the Covid-19 pandemic. Unfortunately, this was also the only time that my udon has been overcooked. The texture was mushy and gluey, though normally it’s the right kind of chewy. I’ve been to Kintaro a half-dozen times previously and every other time there was soft bossa nova playing. If you can get over Brazilian music in a Japanese place in Peru, it was nice background music. This time they had turned off the music. Previously, there was a cool call button on each table. Those are now gone too. (I’ll update this if the next time I go there the bossa nova and call buttons are back).
The Timeline: Start to finish, this was lunch in just under an hour.
It took less than a minute to be seated and less than a minute again to get the menu. I had to ask for the lunch menu, since we were initially only handed the regular menu.
7 minutes: Our order was taken
11 minutes: We were brought silverware and chopsticks, the muchiga tea and cold wet towels for our hands. (They were wet, not damp).
15 minutes: We were served miso soup
19 minutes: The server brought two jars of lemonade. You have to mix the lemonade yourself because all of the sugar syrup is at the bottom. Don’t try drinking that straight! The straws were awkwardly short for the jars, which are new. Before I’ve been served lemonade in a regular glass.
20 minutes: Our udon arrived, accompanied by a small dish of dried chili pepper flakes.
35 minutes: We finished eating, mostly because the udon was overcooked and we didn’t want to eat all of it.
46 minutes: The udon bowls were cleared, though the miso bowls and cold wet towels were left on the table. We asked for refills of the muchiga tea.
48 minutes: The server brought dessert and a thermos to refill our tea.
50 minutes: We finished the dessert and tried to flag down a server.
56 minutes: We got the check for s/50.
58 minutes: The server came back to see if we needed change, which we didn't.
How to get there
Less than a block from the Plaza de Armas, Kintaro is one of the easiest places to get to, though not necessarily the easiest place to find.
How to actually find the place
From calle Plateros, you have to enter an odd little passageway full of souvenirs and women who offer massage for s/20 an hour. Behind the sign in the photo is the entrance and stairway up to the restaurant itself. If you’re out in the street looking for the restaurant, look up. It’s the only roofline in the street with domed, Japanese-esque eaves. It’s also the only building that has Japanese lettering on the outside. However, you do have to look up. It’s not particularly apparent from the sidewalk.
