Astoria's Shuya Ramen Restaurant To Close After 7 Years

ASTORIA, QUEENS — Shuya Cafe de Ramen is closing its Broadway restaurant next month after nearly seven years dishing out healthy and creative bowls of broth and noodles, its owner announced this week.

"It's very sad to say good bye but we decided not to renew the lease and close the restaurant in Astoria on January 15th," owner Shuya Miyawaki wrote in an Instagram post on Wednesday.

The last three years had been "very tough," Miyawaki wrote — though the restaurant had "at least survived and business finally caught up to pre pandemic level."

Shuya opened in February 2016 on Broadway between 42nd and 43rd streets, with an artsy interior and a unique menu focusing on chicken and fish broths, rather than the typical pork — which Miyawaki said helped reduce fat and MSG.

Its small "tapas" plates have centered on vegetables, like a spicy bean sprout salad, an assortment of pickled greens, and a popular brussels sprout tempura dish.

"I’m really interested in the vegetables," Miyawaki told QNS in 2016. "My career is not based on vegetables so I needed something else and that was the ramen."

Formerly based in Tokyo, Miyawaki had also been executive chef at ramen spots in Los Angeles and the West Village, and worked as a sushi chef in Brooklyn, before opening Shuya, QNS reported.

"Thank you everybody for coming and support," Miyawaki wrote this week. "It's been very happy to be part of Astoria Queens."

With Shuya's closure, the remaining ramen shops in Astoria include Tamashii on Broadway, Susuru on 36th Avenue, and HinoMaru on Ditmars Boulevard.

Miyawaki said he is working on a "new project" and vowed to open a new restaurant somewhere else, adding that he would share updates with his Astoria customers.

"Before that happens i will go back to Japan for the first time in 12 years and enjoy and recharge energy for new chapter of my life," he wrote.