Bad Bones Ramen

We had a very long wait. But I absolutely do not fault the restaurant. It is a small place and it was a Saturday night in downtown St John’s. One service person and she was kind, sweet and a star. There are two guys in the kitchen on food and dishes. All in all we waited to get in but the wait for food was not too bad.

First the sides. The tempura was acceptable. Pretty good. Not crispy though. But good flavor, your oil needs to be a bit hotter and try adding a little oil to the batter.

The gyoza was good. Could have a little more green onion in the inside, but you cook them properly. Pan fried. Crispy bottom and soft top. This is the first time in the last 9 years I have seen this. We live in the states, have done for the past 9 years and all gyoza are frozen factory ones and then deep fried. These were so much better. Not so traditional however, but they are your gyoza and they are very good.

All three “ramen” we tried were very good. Presentation, toppings, and the soups were all good. The pork was strange but not bad. If you are expecting chashu it isn’t. It is pork. But they are not advertising chashu. Of the three the Tantanmen was best. The soup was really good. Not the best I have had but really good. There are sooo many different variations of ramen in Japan. It is an art and every chef has his own variation. For those who have opinions on the flavor or the saltiness or whatever, again this is the chefs choice. There is no “correct”.

I have two points of disappointment here. And they are big. Ramen should he served piping nuclear hot. This like all other ramen we have had in North America was kinda hot. But not hot enough. Hotter than warm but not like a Japanese ramen shop hot. But I do not fault the restaurant for this. North America is litigious about these things and if you wanted to serve the ramen like in Japan you would need all your guests to sign a wavier. So I get it. I don’t deduct anything for this. Just expressing myself. I have lost so much mouth skin over the years with ramen in Japan.

The big disappoint, is a big one. The noodles. These are not ramen noodles. They tasted like old dry somen, or Chinese lo mein, or chow mein. Cant put my finger on it. But they are not ramen. Ramen are wheat noodles (sometimes with egg) and they should be crinkly. They are cooked in alkaline water (baking powder). They should be thicker and almost a little chewy. What a ramen noodle actually is, is the one thing that unities all ramen as ramen. It is the only real consistency amongst all shops. Be them road side Yattai or proper stores they all have ramen.

I lived in Japan for 20 years. I have eaten ramen from Hokkaido all the way down to Okinawa. I have a pretty good understanding of this.

I have seen the store owner saying in other reviews “we don’t make Japanese ramen”well ramen is a type of noodle. Your noodles are not ramen so it is simply incorrect to call it ramen. It would be like calling ramen pasta of a salmon a cod. Yes. It is still a noodle but not the noodle you are expecting. You serve great bowls of soup with noodles in them.

Good ramen is three things, soup, toppings, and noodles. (And heat but I waive the heat). If I compare this to 20 years of ramen in Japan, and that is hundreds of Bowls, it would pan out like this :

Soup: 80%. Yea. Top 20th percentile. That is good. (Tantanmen)

Toppings: 70%. Sorry you will never have the same things as in Japan.

Noodles : 1%. Sorry. Just not ramen.

So that makes 50%. And I give 10% for the creativity. I know how hard it is to get stuff in Newfoundland, and they are doing well.

And for the creativity I would say great job.

I was happy and surprised to see ramen here. I have not lived here in 30 years. Fantastic.

If you have never had great ramen in Japan this is very good and you won’t know the difference.

But man. If you could get proper ramen noodles. It would just be spectacular.