Kitchen Nankai has been feeding Jimbōchō's book browsers and Meiji University students since the 1960s, and the queue out the door at lunchtime hasn't changed much in that time. The curry — thick, dark, and built on simmered beef or pork — is a Tokyo institution in its own right, part of the city's distinctive take on Japanese curry rather than anything close to its Indian roots.
The room is small, the tables close together, and the turnover fast, which is the point: this is a working lunch spot for a neighbourhood of booksellers and students, not a destination restaurant, and that's exactly its appeal.