Sunday night. Empty restaurant bar one table. And he was finishing off.

Ordered the butter ramen and the fried rce set.

The ramen came with the usual char siu and corn and a large knob of Hokkaido butter. The onions and spring onions aplenty. The soup was a white bone stock with white miso and garlic oil. It was strong, full of flavour just like the ones I've had in Sapporo. Surprised at the quality of the stock.

The ramen was the curly yellow type and with the soup and ingredients, it was quit substantial. The accompanying friend rice had egg and bits of charsiu too, so taken together this was a large enough meal even for 2.

Popped in for lunch previously for a chicken tikka kebab. Through th lettuce you can spot some chicken in there, wasn't a lot. But OK for $48 with a drink.

Saturday went for some lamb vindaloo and naan. The naan was done just right, a little crispy, not burnt. The lamb was tender and with the spicey curry it was a mouthful. Good taste. There was excess sauce, so I aked them to pack it for me to take home.

Chicken tikka was also tender, sizzling on its hotplate as it arrived. Had that with vegetable byriani. The rice, quite a large portion, was well spiced and tasted good.

If you arrive just after 6pm, you can be seated right away. At one time we arrived a little late, so it was full. We went across the road to Smart Pepperoni and ordered the curries from there. The restaurants are owned by the same people, so their food and seating can be interchangeable. And you'll get 2 differnt bills when you settle.

Good food, good service.

Arriving at 11:40, it was easy to get seated.

Ordered the white 叉燒拉麵, pork bone soup.
black 叉燒拉麵, roasted garlic soup.

The ramen was actually the thick type that you'd find in many other places and need to bite harder. The charsiu was thick cut, tender, tasty. The spring onion atop of that was plentiful and really went well with the soup.

The white soup was very tasty, quite salty too, in contrast to my black garlic soup, which had less in body. You can taste the garlic in its composition but it was quite faint.Next time I'll order the white soup.

Sunday lunch. Arrived to join the queue before they opened. Didin't get in first round to had to wait 35 mins for the next.

Haing got in, we quickly ordered the Kyushu ramen 九州拉麵、and charsiu ramen 叉燒拉麵, spicey miso. Watching the ramen chefs mix the soup and cook the ramen, I was impressed with their speed and efficiency. The ramen came very quickly and the toppings were quite generous. Having gone through most of the bowl, I found that there was still quite a bit left. This ramen shop's portions are large in comparison to others of the same quality bracket.

Extraordinary aspects
- Large servings
- charsiu burnt outside and tender inside. Very tasty, quite unique in HK.
- prices well below what you'd expect for this kind of quality

Ordinary bits
- The soup base underperformed given the craft the chef put into it. Not enough body to the taste.

There were people waiting well past 1 hour to be seated, is it worth that long a wait? Depends how hungr you are I suppose. For me, it was worth the 30 minute wait.

Bombay's old location suffered from being next to Ah Lung and really expensive rent. The place was full most evenings but still the rent killed it. To my delight, they have re-opened on Temple Street.

I went for my usual bellwether dish, the Seekh kebab. As I remembered it, it was moist, steamy succulent served atop cabbage and raw onions cooking on the hotplate. It came exactly as I remembered, except it was a lesser meal that it had been. At $60, that can be forgiven. Although it was not substantial, it was adequate.

Welcome back Bombay.