Back in mid year 2010, a ramen frenzy has since started in Hong Kong, this is all began with one ramen (拉麵) restaurant they even began hype before their grand opening with the help of local TV show and gourmet columnist – Butao Ramen 豚王.Apart from the ramen, Butao is most famous for its long queues, limited servings of ramen and it’s street side sitting; these all together create the success formula for them and thus sparking the frenzy of ramen in the Hong Kong dining scene.Butao ramen is known for only serving limited number of ramen per day, and when the ramen stockpile reaches zero, the shop closes. Therefore creating the long queues almost 2 hours before it opens daily, with the people in anticipation for a hot bowl of authentic ramen prepared by Japanese ramen chef, and to be eaten at street side – the feeling of a typical ramen stall in Japan.Comparing with the ramen from other restaurants that opened after Butao, Butao’s ramen is truly delicious. This is the only ramen restaurant making me to visiting them again and again.

Butao’s menu features only four flavors of ramen: Butao (豚王), Red King (赤王), Dark King (黑王) and Green King (翠王), plus rumored “secret flavors” namely the Genki King (元気王) and Prawn King (海老王), since they’re not on the menu. As of today I have tried Butao (豚王)(again and again), Black King (黑王) and Prawn King (海老王). To make an order, you get to “customize” your ramen with their “signature” ordering slip, you can customize the strength of the ramen (that is how long should the ramen be cooked), intensity and spiciness of the soup base, soft-boiled egg, side dishes etc..No matter which variant of the ramen you choose, the ramen’s soup base is intensely rich and thick – the result of hours of stewing of pork bones. Ones may consider the soup is too oily, but however I see this is the true nature of authentic Japanese ramen, if it isn’t be this, just light and clear, this is already a Hong Kong localized noodle but not a Ramen, I would rather then suggest you have instant noodles instead.

Normally I would eat with extra portion of ramen and drink all the soup: it’s the politeness in respect to the ramen chef and also to show the chef how much you liked.The ramen scene in Hong Kong is blooming, though the days before Butao there has already ramen restaurants like Domen or Ramen Santouka, but was not trending yet and they’re just hiding around the city. Now everywhere is just about new ramen restaurant opening – each representing different variant of Japanese ramen. I guess this is how lucky Hong Konger is, I hope the ramen trend can last as long as it can!