We report on a 12-year-old boy with neurofibromatosis type 1 who suffered a transient ischemic attack. Angiography revealed occlusion of intracranial arteries, moyamoya vessels and leptomeningeal collaterals. The conventional T2-weighted and the diffusion-weighted MRI images demonstrated no pathology. Dynamic first-pass postgadolinium T2* perfusion-weighted MRI depicted altered hemodynamics in the vascular territory of the left middle cerebral artery, which defined this region as ischemic tissue at risk. The patient suffered a repeat transient ischemic attack 5 days later.