Honō Ramen — Restaurant in Quebec

I visited with two friends on the 9th of November 2022 in the evening. I had already tried Hono Izakaya previously and adored my experience. This place is like a sister restaurant directly connected to each other. The welcoming was great as well as the service throughout. I learned that you can only reserve online. I recommend doing so to guarantee a spot. The restaurant was mostly full.

The restaurant has a few really unique coktails. I really liked the Yu-Gin (home made ingredients). We shared a karaage together as an entrée. The chicken was crispy and the sauce nice and zesty. For my main dish, I got the miso ramen with extra chashu, egg and spicy sauce. The spicy sauce on the side is perfect to dip food in. The broth was really creamy and had excellent depth to it. Though I felt a light granular feel to it. The eggs are perfectly marinated and the egg yolk deserves a moment of appreciation. The meat in the ramen melted literally in my mouth. Make sure to eat the meat first. I also got a Highball Dewar's, something that Japanese are quite fond of. I preferred the Yu-Gin personally due to its light sweetness.

I also got a Japanese cheese cake that I found lacking in the cheese department, but learned from our server, a kind tall blond haired and beautifully tattooed woman, that this was the way that Japanese made this type of cheese cake. I was happy to try it in the end.

We stayed about 3 hours in the restaurant. I will definitely return to try out the other types of broths. All in all, it was an amazing night with great company and a restaurant that gave off a welcoming, quiet ,and cozy atmosphere.

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2023-01-20 at 5:00 PM

My second visit went equally marvelously. I brought a great friend that we often make home made ramen meals before watching a good movie. I tried the tonkotsu daily dish and again added two portions of meat, two eggs and spicy sauce on the side. The beefy broth was extra rich and quite enticing. Not as exquisite as the miso broth, but a close second. That's in addition to the Sapporo with ginger ale I barely finished due to sheer quantity (is was really refreshing, bit the "small bock" is enough to quench most thirsts.

My friend particularly loved the edamame. They were warm, their skin more tender than usual and seasoned to perfection. He enjoyed the karaage, but feels that another restaurant on St-Joseph has an edge over Hono Ramen.

The woman that welcomed us at the entrance is the same that served me last time. She recognized within an instant and was just as kind as the first time. Our waitress that had lovely transparent manicured nails honored us with her attention to detail and kindness throughout.

Another five star experience ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

2025-02-19

I returned with my friend Simon to celebrate the completion of the ink work for his next graphic novel. Emmanuelle served us wonderfully.

Sapporo buck with ginger Yuzu, and Yuzu slush was refreshingly good. Our karaage chicken, ramen, and chocolate treat were exquisite.

Five...

I am from Toronto, so I am eating this based on my perspective in comparison to Ramen shops there. I booked a reservation online, which requires you to put your credit card info in order to confirm. Basically, if you don't show up they have the authorization to charge you $20 per person. We were promptly seated 5 mins after our reservation time, which was 8:00pm.

The shop's atmosphere was very trendy and posh. A great place to hang out, have a drink, chill and have a nice evening out with friends or a date.

Service was excellent. The hosts and servers were attentive and friendly. Being from Ontario, they were helpful and spoke English to you.

As for food, I think I am spoiled coming from Toronto who has tons of Ramen shops runned by authentically Japanese owned operators. Presentation is great overall, but the taste slightly lacking the umami that is expected of ramen places that I have tried in Toronto (i.e. Kinton, iiShin, Midori Ramen, etc.)

Nevertheless, I would still recommend this place for those from the 416 area who are in QC and craving ramen. This post is just for you the set your...

Ramen is a bowl of art in my opinion. The broth is the soul, the noodles are the body and the toppings are accessories.

The restaurant is beautiful and modern, maybe too modern for a ramen place. But I understand this is the approach for local people.

Let's talk about the ramen. My bf and I both had shoyu aka soy sauce.

Broth - way too salty, bland, lack of depth. Where is the soul?

Noodles - actually pretty good, not overly cooked. It was thicker than all the ramen I had before, not sure if it's really authentic (and I had ramen in multiple cities in Canada, USA, Japan and Taiwan).

Toppings - chashu was surprisingly good. Red ginger and Bok Choy were okay, they are not the traditional toppings but I understand it may be difficult to source authentic Asian ingredients. Perhaps considering to eliminate red ginger - it's pickled so it has lots of salt.

I feel the restaurant is making a good effort so I gave 3 stars. A bit pricy because of fewer competitors in a small city with a very tiny Asian population. The food was okay for me, I would think very...