On Ramen
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OZ ON - a series on a variety of subjects I enjoy.
Explorations of food, music, places, personal items, etc. on an infrequent basis. These posts may be expanded in the future with additional thoughts and recommendations as they occur.
Today’s subject: Japanese Ramen, and local restaurants which serve it.
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Tokiwa
During the Christmas break, the family finally had the opportunity to try Tokiwa. The dining room tends to get full and stay full straight from opening, so you want to go before lunch - there’s often a line at the door before 11am. The broths take many hours to prepare, so once the day’s supply is consumed Tokiwa closes shop, and it seems they sell out every day. I’ve tried four of their ramen soups over three visits. All of them were excellent, but the creamy sesame-broth Goma Goma is tremendous. They offer spicy and mild versions, but the amount of chilli oil added to the mild is not consistent. Other recommended items: the Black Garlic soup, Tokyo Tonkotsu soup, the Yuzu Shio citrus soup, and the Pulled Pork seaweed rice. I don’t know if I’ve ever had an “authentic” bowl of ramen, and I don’t particularly care. But I’ve eaten some amazing bowls of noodle soup around the world, and I enjoy Tokiwa’s very much. Highly recommended.
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Prairie Noodle Shop
My first experience at Prairie Noodle Shop was over a year ago. It was badly timed; I was having a terrible day; I don’t remember the food clearly. We hoped our second visit would clean the slate, and for the most part it did. I had the prairie pork shio ramen soup (which is probably also what I ordered on my first visit), and the missus ordered the spicy miso pork ramen soup. Neither were as powerfully flavourful as some other ramen bowls we’ve enjoyed, but they were pleasant. We also started with a variety of their steamed bao sandwiches which were exceptional. I could eat several hundred gladly. We were lucky to get them - the steamer caught fire earlier that day, so we were warned they might be unavailable. To drink, we ordered a bottle of delicious sake and some water. The service this time wasn’t strong, but overall the meal was decent. I probably wouldn’t drive across town to eat there again, but wouldn’t hesitate to return if already nearby.
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Nomiya
Given our positive experiences with ramen recently, we wanted to sample a few spots nearer to home. Nomiya is a short drive away, and the restaurant was days away from celebrating an anniversary. We ordered two bowls of ramen here: a tokotsu and a shio. Both were perfectly fine, but neither had the wonderful brutality of flavour offered by similar dishes at Tokiwa.
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Edo Japan
A staple of Canadian food courts, Edo now has some stand-alone restaurants offering basically the same Teppanyaki food preparations. Some of their rice and/or noodle dishes can be really solid food-court options next to heat lamp pizza and old burgers. They’ve recently added ramen bowls to their menu, so I tried one while stuck in the west end. Nothing remarkable, but it was perfectly fine and a solid option if you want soup and you’re eating in a mall.
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Bonus: Mr. Noodles
For all the above, ramen’s reputation is probably most-closely tied with cheap instant noodles, which consist of little more than boiling water and a packet of powder containing salt, MSG, and dried flakes of various textures. But these can be a handy platform for quick meals at home if you want soup with no prep time. We’ll often keep frozen vegetables in the fridge, and then add them along with some good beef stock and various other flavourings to make a passable bowl of noodle soup. These can range from forgettable to brilliant depending on your luck and choice of ingredients.
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