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2014-04-18
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So, I've eaten tons of instant noodles in my life. (I highly recommend the spicy flavor Shin Ramyun, by the way.) But, surprisingly, I've only had ramen-- real ramen, restaurant ramen-- once before in my life. Seven years before moving here I lived in New Jersey, and while Jersey has a wide variety of ethnic cuisines available, I only knew one Japanese place. And their ramen was terrible.Anyway, so this bowl of No. 1 might officially be my first real bowl of ramen. Here are my entirely untutored
So, I've eaten tons of instant noodles in my life. (I highly recommend the spicy flavor Shin Ramyun, by the way.) But, surprisingly, I've only had ramen-- real ramen, restaurant ramen-- once before in my life. Seven years before moving here I lived in New Jersey, and while Jersey has a wide variety of ethnic cuisines available, I only knew one Japanese place. And their ramen was terrible.Anyway, so this bowl of No. 1 might officially be my first real bowl of ramen. Here are my entirely untutored thoughts:
Noodles: You can order them soft, regular, hard, or very hard and I went with hard. For me, that was the right choice. They got a little too soft for my taste by the end of the bowl, but that's partly my fault for being a slow eater. To be honest (and utterly low class, I admit), I like the instant noodles better, largely because they are deep fried and full of saturated fat. But these are very good noodles all the same.
Broth: Way saltier than I expected; it was fine at the beginning but toward the end of the bowl I found the saltiness a little overwhelming. My wife thinks it was less salty than other soups we've eaten around town-- pho or Yunnan noodles-- so maybe I'm just totally wrong on this one. For the most part I liked the broth. It was less meaty-tasting than I expected.
Pork slices: Nice and tender, very flavorful pork, with a perfectly agreeable thickness, not too much fat and no gristle. This was quality meat as opposed to most of the trash that goes in the pho around here.
Spicy snow vegetable: I didn't add much to my soup, but I will recommend the spicy snow vegetable. I honestly cannot tell you more about what this is, but I do recommend it.
General thoughts: Overall, I liked the soup. I'm really big into noodle soup, and I intend to try more ramen when I get the chance. It's certainly better broth-wise and noodle-wise than the ubiquitous and mediocre pho scattered all over town. As far as noodles go, I probably prefer the best wonton noodles (think Wing Wah), but the noodles here are very good. As far as broth goes... I'm partial to the Cantonese beef brisket soup and spicy Yunnan soup, but I did like this broth. I just didn't love it.
A-
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