Red Light Ramen — Restaurant in Nelson

What an absolutely terrible experience and evening. We called ahead to ask if the restaurant could accommodate our group of 13 right then and were told yes. We showed up at 710 and the restaurant was mostly empty aside from a few patio tables who were only drinking. We said we were hungry and wanted to order when we got there. The waitress insisted on taking our drink order first. Drinks took over 30 minutes to receive, during which time I asked again to order food. Around when we got our drinks the restaurant was filling up and tables were receiving their drinks and food quickly. Frustratingly a 4 top that arrived one hour after we had and ordered well after us, received their food and drinks and left before we even received a dish at our table. The kitchen literally cooked our meals last. Each table that arrived after us was served and out of there. When I asked the server what was going on she said there were a lot of reservations basically telling us the poor service was intentional. They were taking the sandwich board sign for the restaurant inside before we had all of our food. When food finally came it took 20+ minutes to receive every person's food. We had 6 kids ages 4-11 and they were all melting and starving. Oh and the food was decently good but not mind blowing. Kid's noodle and broth bowls were half filled and $10.50. It was so little food we had to walk back to the car to get our 6 year old (light water girl) a granola bar. Yet our friends ordered another bowl of noodles and chicken for their kid (same as what we ordered minus the broth) and it came in the same bowl overflowing with noodles and chicken and only cost $2.25. Huh? I ordered crispy tofu for my kiddo which was nowhere close to crispy. It maybe touched a fry pan. There were 3 huge chunks of tofu and a few vegetables for $16. The Dan Dan noodles were good but nowhere close to worth the wait. My husband however was puking and pooping out his ramen by the time we got back to our campground 20 minutes away. We wanted something relatively quick and delicious before we went back to camping. We were not able to leave the restaurant until 925. We ate promptly and I asked to pay while we were eating to ensure we could depart...

It's below average at best. I've had ramen from all over (NYC, LA, Toronto, Vancouver, Dallas and San Francisco). So my standards are high. I should have went to Marzano for dinner. I had the Tan Tan Chicken Ramen. The broth was flavourless. I had to add some salt and i ended up dipping my noodles in the dipping sauce provided with the shrimp dumplings (more on this later). A pack of seasoning in Mr. Noodles is packed with flavour if you compare it to what I had at RLR. The noodles had a nice chewiness and texture. The chicken wasn't grilled or roasted, it seemed boiled. The chicken was also flavourless which I also dipped in dumpling sauce. Was not impressed.

The dumplings - served steaming hot which is great but also lacked flavour. I didn't taste any shrimp - it could have very well been filler. All the flavour came from the dipping sauce which was the best tasting thing at RLR.

It was busy when I arrived at 8pm but there was one server working the tables - 5 tables and one server at the bar. I seated myself and waited 5 minutes for a menu. Food came quickly though. The thing I hate is when using the credit card machine and the tip options start at 20%. For those who don't know that you can push the % to change the tip, then they are forced to tip at 20% which the service at the restaurant was no where near that.

Overall a...

Stopped in here for some early dinner after I’ve been meaning to check out Red Light Ramen when I visit Nelson. Ordered the chicken tantan, gyoza and dandan noodles. The broth was lacking depth, missing that miso/umami flavour and the ginger in the ramen threw the flavours off. The noodles were unfortunately bland, and the broth didn’t make up for it.

Gyoza were good but nothing spectacular, at $15.50 for 6 I expected more flavour. Gyoza wrapper seemed doughy to me. Dandan noodles were very sticky and gooey, and lacked the savoury flavour they were meant to have. Again, nothing spectacular at $17.50. Seems they have a large wine and Japanese whisky menu, but I didnt try any drinks. Service was also just okay, I received the pork tantan when I ordered the chicken tantan. While still edible, it wasn’t what I ordered.

I understand their credo is that don’t follow Japanese cuisine in regards to ramen and use local ingredients while being sustainable and I appreciate that. But when the ramen noodles themselves don’t taste much different than a pack of Nissin instant noodles, I feel disappointed.

All in all we had an okay experience, not bad but not great. I don’t think I’d return here for another chance to be redeemed...