Dokamea – Ticket Restaurant

Okinawa Hai

14 years ago

CONTRIBUTED BY KRISTY DEMOE

So the other day my family and I were out looking for a quick place to eat near the house. We wandered over toward the farmer’s market and saw a restaurant that looked promising.

So in we went. After standing around for a bit and looking at the menu with pictures of the food, but no English, a really nice Japanese woman came up to us. We were a bit confused that she didn’t want to take our order or seat us, but then she showed us the machine that we are supposed to use to order.

It took a while, but we finally were able to match what we wanted to the buttons on the machine. It was like a Japanese “I Spy,” and the kids loved helping. The little machine popped out the tickets and we handed them to the gentleman behind the counter. Then we sat down to wait.

There are two American style tables and about ten tatami tables, a drink station offering water and tea, and an ice box containing pickled Goya and radish, which was pretty good. When the food came out we were in shock. There was so much of it! The portions were huge, and it was so delicious.

My husband ordered something that came out on a sizzling skillet and it was hot the entire meal. We ordered a salad with ramen and cold meat in it for my daughter and it came in a stainless steel bowl with ice cubes in it to keep it cool. My very picky son ordered a dish with rice, meat, and a wonderful sauce, and despite the large portion, ate almost all of it. I ordered the soba, which came with rice, seaweed salad, and fried chicken balls. I can’t think of anything that wasn’t delicious and we all swapped bowls and tried each others food since there was so much of it. We ordered six meals and a side of dumplings for just under 5000 yen –well worth it, in my opinion. Everybody was full and very happy with what they ordered.

Dokamea – Ticket Restaurant

Payment: Only Yen is accepted

Hours: The hours are 10 am to 11 pm.

Phone: 934-0757

Address: 1 Chome-8-3 Noborikawa

Google Maps Coordinates: 26.36787270601792, 127.81834150484588

Directions: Go out Kadena gate 3, continue on past Shields. At 329 when 26 dead ends, turn left into the far right lane. The restaurant is immediately there on your right across the street from the farmer’s market on the bottom floor of the Takara building. It’s an orange and red building. There was no English anywhere, but it’s called Dokamea.