At the Olympics this year, the world watched American pommel horse phenomenon Stephen Nedoroscik demonstrate the power of specialization. As his gymnast teammates flung themselves through vaults, bounced through floor routines and spun around bars, Nedoroscik channeled every ounce of his skill, training, and energy into his single event.

Elmer Komagata is the pommel horse guy of ramen.

In developing the menu for Midnite Ramen, Komagata worked with a manufacturer in Japan to customize par-cooked noodles that cook to his exact desired texture in just 15 seconds, so he can prepare orders on his tiny truck. He used his decades of fine-dining experience to devise ethereal broths that feel light on the tongue while remaining rich with flavor.

But when he moved his cart to a permanent location with an on-site commissary kitchen, like America’s nerdiest double medalist, Komagata needed to build a skilled team around him.

In April, Figurehead Brewing opened an outpost of its Magnolia Brewery on Stone Way in Fremont. Komagata parked his Midnite Ramen trailer inside, just a few steps from the commissary kitchen he now shares with Ooshiba Yakitori and Sushi.

Each operates as a separate business, which means to get myself a bowl of Komagata’s spicy miso ramen, sticks of Ooshiba’s infinitely tender chicken meatballs for my kids, and my husband a pint of Figurehead’s West Wall Session IPA, I needed to place three different orders in three different places.

I added a fourth stop (and a third little black pager that beeped to alert me when my food was ready) when I wanted to try the schnitzelesque crispy ji-pai fried chicken and soft, octopus-filled takoyaki which Komagata serves from his own commissary kitchen, 15 feet from the cart. The gyoza, for which Komagata has a dedicated specialist trained and solely focused on, has a whole other ticketing system.

Confused? You’re not alone. “That's probably been the biggest hurdle that we've had,” says Bob Monroe of Figurehead. A maze of bureaucratic permitting and licensing regulations shaped the setup, which is a bit of a logistical nightmare. But for everyone involved—Monroe, Komagata, and more than anything, Seattleites hungry for a variety of excellent Japanese foods—it’s a dream come true.

Cart Culture

The culture of little family-owned food carts in Japan called yatai has almost completely disappeared since Komagata formed fond childhood memories of eating late-night ramen at them.

Komagata left Japan in 1984 and cooked his way through the Michelin-starred kitchens of France. He landed in Los Angeles as Ruth Reichl chronicled the rise of fusion restaurants and California cuisine in the 1990s. Then he moved on, running the dining programs for big hotels in Mexico for 14 years. With each step, his vision solidified: he wanted to share the traditions of the yatai, and—after visiting a friend here—he knew he wanted to do it in Seattle.

Following a quick stop to open a ramen shop in Southern California, Komagata moved to Seattle in 2015 and started working toward his downsizing dream: going from managing a 120-person kitchen to making just 120 bowls of ramen a night, alongside his wife, Izumi.

In 2020, he finished outfitting a seven- by 10-foot trailer with the red noren fabric curtains and pop-out bar typical of yatai. He studied ramen varieties and techniques from around Japan and used that to compose his menu: '50s-style classic ramen from Tokyo, onomichi from Hiroshima, which uses an anchovy broth slicked with pork fat, and the signature Kumamoto Miso Bold with blackened garlic and chili oil. Instead of the milky, rich pork broths trendy in the US at the time, he incorporated clarifying techniques from French cuisine and built flavor using Chinese preserved vegetables to make a base broth that was light and clear.

At 65, Komagata was significantly older than most people starting a food cart. And while most of them want to park outside breweries, all he wanted was to park inside one. For three and a half years, Midnite Ramen made it work, parking outside Figurehead’s Magnolia location and Obec Brewing in Ballard. The grueling work of cooking, transporting, and selling at breweries limited Komagata’s capacity during that time. But it was only the first step.

Well Connected

Parking outside Figurehead three nights a week, Komagata got to know Monroe pretty well, filling him in on his dream to recreate the yatai culture with a little cluster of Japanese street food businesses.

When Figurehead began planning its own expansion two years ago, they looked at the landscape of breweries in Seattle and asked themselves what was missing. “Most breweries don't have in-house food, or really good food on premise,” says Monroe. “They’re focused on beer.”

They invited Komagata to make the plan for the kitchen.

The Fremont space technically spans two buildings; the first is all Figurehead, a long, wide room often filled with families and big groups, much like any other taproom in town. But toward the back, the room narrows to a breezeway, where Komagata’s yatai-style cart now lives. Continuing back, it opens up again. Along the north wall sits a pair of electronic kiosks for ordering, the kitchen takes up most of the rest of the room.

Midnite Ramen operates like any other food truck or cart in town, preparing food in a commissary kitchen, then transporting it to the mobile unit for serving. The difference here is that the cart is just a few steps from the kitchen and doesn’t go anywhere.

Finding himself with plenty of kitchen space and not quite enough capital, Komagata looked to ease his costs by inviting Ooshiba Yakitori and Sushi to rent space in the commissary kitchen. Komagata met sushi chef Hiroshi Kakuta and his friend Hirotaka Muramstsu when he first moved to Seattle, in 2015, through a consulting job at Sushi Kashiba.

In the years since, Muramatsu had realized that Seattle lacked a good yakitori restaurant. A friend in Tokyo with a yakitori stand sent him a recipe, and “The two Hiros” created Ooshiba, grilling up skewers of glazed chicken, bites of glistening pork, and assortments of fresh sushi. Starting in 2022, Ooshiba set up as a popup alongside Midnite Ramen at Figurehead’s Magnolia Taproom, then made the jump with Komagata to Fremont.

Now Pouring

In April, Figurehead opened its Fremont Taproom. When Midnite Ramen, Ooshiba, and the commissary kitchen are all cranking, the back room takes on an air of excitement, like a night market, as people bustle back and forth to retrieve their orders. The foods work well together, and it’s fun to snack on a stick of charred shishito peppers while waiting for a bowl of ramen.

Komagata and Ooshiba stagger their days off, ensuring Japanese street food every night of the week. Figurehead added drinks that fit with the Japanese food, with a sake collection, loose-leaf tea sourced from Ballard’s Floating Leaves Tea, and even the Japanese soda, Ramune. More confusingly, Figurehead has its own food menu, too, though Monroe downplays that: they need to have it because they have a restaurant license, and thus must serve food.

Midnite Ramen and Ooshiba are technically a separate business, so they don’t count, and the confusion that creates frustrates Monroe. “We’re big on interactions with customers, building that sense of community, and creating connections,” he says. He doesn’t care if guests come in for only Komagata’s food, he just wishes they wouldn’t ignore his servers, especially if the setup confuses them. “My staff is super helpful,” says Monroe. “Come find one of my bartenders; they’d happily go back and show you where to order and how to do it.”

Of course, this is Seattle and that would require talking to people. Which circles back to Monroe’s original intention for the taproom: to connect with people. It’s the growing pains of a new business model, one which Komagata is proud to pioneer. “[We are] experiencing a pain of giving a baby birth,” he tells me. As a mother of two, I receive that with a little skepticism. But I have more faith in what he says next: “I believe this business model is one of the solutions to survive.” The cooperation between the three companies makes things a bit complicated for the diner, but a lot easier for small entrepreneurs.

The many options also made it easier to find something my kids wanted to eat, making dinner feel less like a grueling Olympic competition than normal. Though, if I were awarding such things, I would give Figurehead a gold medal in family-friendliness for the bowl on their counter inviting children to grab a free Pokémon card.