Pasta for Everyone! Three Restaurants for a Delicious Thick Pasta Feast

"Have you eaten to your heart's content?" asks the chef, a lady, at the end of my meal.
"Oh, yes!" I reply. "At first, when you served me, I thought that it was a quite small portion. But the plate actually goes quite deep—it took me a while to see the bottom!"
"We are not stingy on the portions here!" she says with a smile on her face.

To get to Mescita, get off at Meguro station and walk down Meguro Street. After walking down the Gonnosuke slope, cross the bridge at Meguro River and keep walking straight until you get to Yamanote Street. Cross Yamanote Street and you'll see the Otori Shrine to your left, but keep on walking. Here you'll also find a good many interior and furniture shops along the road, from second-hand stores to more trendy ones.

Eventually you'll reach the Moto-Keibajo intersection, which literally means "former racecourse." As this name implies, there used to be a horse racecourse in the vicinity. The intersection as well as a nearby bus stop have been affectionately named after it, although though there is no such official address. There's a bronze statue of a horse standing at this intersection, too, so it's hard to miss. From here, turn right and you will soon arrive at Mescita. The face of this restaurant isn't lit up though, so be careful not to walk on past!

The pasta cooked here is 1.9 mm thick in diameter, with each serving contains 120g of pasta. I order a wild rocket salad and tomato sauce pasta with Hokkaido sardine.

The thick pasta noodles have apparently been boiled in a salty broth and boast a unique flavor. The tomato sauce soaks into the pasta effectively as well—in fact, each ingredient compliments the dish equally well. My side of rocket salad, from Chiba prefecture, is more than generous, too.

One of the many great restaurants on the shopping street that is Azabu-Juban, Trattoria Che Pacchia offers extra-thick pasta, called spaghettoni, which is 2.1 mm in diameter. It takes a good 15 minutes to boil, and makes an excellent base for hearty traditional Italian cuisine. Spaghettoni soaks up the sauce, while the al dente spring in each bite is outstanding. The flavor of the wheat fills up the mouth impressively, too. I recommend the traditional trippa with spaghettoni. A standard of Italian cuisine, it is made of beef stomach marinated in a tomato sauce.

The Yotsunohashi shopping street near Shibuya River in Shirokane is one of Tokyo's historic and much-loved shopping streets. Rozzo Sicilia is located in this area. The staple dish here is pasta with bottargo with green tomato. This restaurant serves bottargo, a Sicilian specialty made of salted, cured fish roe. The salty bottargo goes perfectly with the tartness of the green tomato. A true delicacy from Sicily, carried on the Mediterranean sea breeze to the shores of Japan.