Kirin Ramen — Restaurant in Wilsonville

Let me start off and say that the ramen, the soy eggs, and the broth was really good. So why the one star? We ordered online - 1 Garlic Tonkatsu, 1 Shoyu Tonkatsu, and one tofu appetizer. We would have ordered another ramen bowl, but at $15 a bowl, the price was just a bit too steep for us. We’ve never been to this place, so to be safe and convenient we ordered online for pick-up. When I arrived, I was greeted and told my food was almost ready. As I waited, I glanced at the menu - $12.50 per ramen bowl? But wait, I paid $15! When I asked the host, she responded with “that’s extra for the online service. We don’t get any of that money. Next time, order by phone.” What?! The online order also charged over $3.50 as a service charge. So for 2 ramen bowls and an appetizer, we got burned an extra $10, almost, for nothing ($2.50 per bowl, $1 for the app, and $3.78 for a service fee). Not worth it! Especially when the online menu said the Garlic Tonkatsu was with chicken and we got nothing but shoe leather pork. And that’s a terrible business practice, by the way. The customer gets screwed because they offer this service with no warning about the price hikes and the response is “next time, call in your order.” Unfortunately, we will not be back. I guess it’s only Ramen Ryoma for us...

This place is OK. I've tried twice now with a friend of mine and more than likely won't go back. The first try was quite disappointing, I had the Garlic Tonkotsu Ramen and my friend had the Shoyu Tonkotsu Ramen. He picked them up as a to go order. When he arrived, we could not tell which was which. I was surprised thinking the garlic would be a dead give away, not so much and no labels! The smoked rolled pork slice was dry as an Oregon lawn in an August heat wave and the smoky flavor smacked you in the face like a scorned woman, it was the only flavor I could decipher. Needless to say the pork was escorted out of the room asap but the smoky flavor stood it's ground. My friend was just about as impressed with his smoky shoe leather pork ramen as I was. We gave it another go last week with the Chicken Mushroom Ramen for me and the Spicy Ramen for him. Thankfully the red tint of the spicy gave just the clue we needed to know which was which. The Chicken Mushroom Raman was actually not unpleasant at all, it did not make me squeal in glee either but it was good comfort food on a cold rainy day. The Spicy Ramen however was just another variation of the previous encounter tinted with red but, unfortunately, not packing much heat.

Maybe they are better for dine in...

The first red flag I had was the time between ordering my meal and sitting down was about two minutes, which is entirely contrary to any other time I've ordered ramen in the last ten years. I was not surprised to find it was just barely lukewarm, but I pressed on.

The oil used to make the broth spicy was visibly pooling in such a way the color contrast between the broth and the oil were readily apparent and tells me there wasn't much to it otherwise for seasoning.

The noodles were alright. I'm a bit skeptical about them being hand pulled though. The rest of the ingredients were ultimately mediocre at best and I had a few good mouthful of noodles before I simply walked out.

The staff were nice, if a bit quiet in the brief time I'd interacted with them and the only reason I'm not taking this review any lower is because I have coworkers who have had experiences completely opposite of my own. HOWEVER. There were also other coworkers who had experiences just like mine. I won't be going back personally and I'd consider going during a busy time to minimize your chances of replicating...