Buta Ramen
Buta Ramen - August 26, 2018
In my last blog I raved about how I love Vietnamese food, well let me tell you, I also really love Japanese food. I've had the pleasure of visiting Japan three times for work/vacation, and it didn't take very long to fall in love with the food there, especially with ramen. The second time I traveled to Japan I literally ate ramen for lunch every day for about 2 weeks. I don't know what it is about ramen, that I can never get sick of it, but it's wonderful.
So given my deep appreciation for this noodley goodness, We are very excited to check out some of the restaurants in Halifax that specialize in ramen. First up: Buta Ramen. Frank Yoon (famous Toronto restauranteur) opened Buta Ramen's doors to the world in the winter of 2017. With only a small street sign, it would be easy to not notice this restaurant on Morris St. The decor of Buta Ramen is beautiful. Not the biggest restaurant, but very well laid out to maximize the space for customers. As you walk through the door you greeted with the customary "Irasshaimase!" (いらっしゃいませ！), meaning "Welcome to the store!" that you would receive when entering a store or restaurant in Japan. We were then seated right away and given the menu and some water. The menu is simple, which is exactly the way it should be. Just a few appetizers, a couple of fried noodle dishes and of course your ramen selections. Interesting that there is a Dolsot Bibimbap on the menu, as this is a Korean dish, and it would be something I'd be interested in trying on a future visit.
It took me about 5 seconds to decide what I wanted to eat; the Tonkotsu Ramen. Tonkotsu ramen has a pork-based broth that takes several hours of boiling until the proper flavor is reached. Ingredients usually include green onion, garlic, hard boiled egg, Chashu (pork belly) and 'Hakata' style noodles.
Nasil, being the spicy food lover, chose the Tantamen ramen, a Japanese adaption of the Sichuan dish Dan Dan noodles.
The food took about 10 minutes to arrive, and when it did we were immediately impressed. The presentation of our ramen's was amazing, as it looked almost to good to eat....but of course that didn't stop us. Also, the huge chunks of pork belly in my ramen, made me super stoked to dive into this beauty. So how did they taste? The flavors of both of ramens were good....but just good. I would love to have written that these two dishes were absolutely amazing and that we'd be back every weekend, but really they were not bad, not great, just good. What's interesting is Nasil and I agreed on the same reason why we thought this ramen wasn't great: it was too healthy. In our minds, ramen should be salty and a bit oily, however, ours seemed as Nasil put it "too neat." Nasil and I are quite healthy eaters, so please don't think have a habit of eating junk food, but when we go out for a dish like ramen you expect it to increase your cholesterol a tiny bit. The noodles were well cooked and an ample portion, and the pork belly was probably the highlight of my Tonkotsu ramen. Nasil's Tantamen had a good dose of spice to it and definitely filled her belly.
Overall we enjoyed our meal at Buta Ramen, and would recommend this spot for a quick lunch. The ramen could be a little better, but the atmosphere and service at Buta Ramen are excellent. We're very excited to have a couple more ramen spots to check out in the HRM, and if you have any suggestions for us on Japanese restaurants or any restaurants, in general, please let us know in the comment section below.
In my last blog I raved about how I love Vietnamese food, well let me tell you, I also really love Japanese food. I've had the pleasure of visiting Japan three times for work/vacation, and it didn't take very long to fall in love with the food there, especially with ramen. The second time I traveled to Japan I literally ate ramen for lunch every day for about 2 weeks. I don't know what it is about ramen, that I can never get sick of it, but it's wonderful.
Nasil, being the spicy food lover, chose the Tantamen ramen, a Japanese adaption of the Sichuan dish Dan Dan noodles.
The food took about 10 minutes to arrive, and when it did we were immediately impressed. The presentation of our ramen's was amazing, as it looked almost to good to eat....but of course that didn't stop us. Also, the huge chunks of pork belly in my ramen, made me super stoked to dive into this beauty. So how did they taste? The flavors of both of ramens were good....but just good. I would love to have written that these two dishes were absolutely amazing and that we'd be back every weekend, but really they were not bad, not great, just good. What's interesting is Nasil and I agreed on the same reason why we thought this ramen wasn't great: it was too healthy. In our minds, ramen should be salty and a bit oily, however, ours seemed as Nasil put it "too neat." Nasil and I are quite healthy eaters, so please don't think have a habit of eating junk food, but when we go out for a dish like ramen you expect it to increase your cholesterol a tiny bit. The noodles were well cooked and an ample portion, and the pork belly was probably the highlight of my Tonkotsu ramen. Nasil's Tantamen had a good dose of spice to it and definitely filled her belly.
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