Osaka Ramen

This is a Japanese noodle soup restaurant. I've seen Ramen houses on TV programs such as Man vs. Food. This is my first time trying the Japanese noodle soup. I have heard that it can be spicy and spicy is what I was in search of.

The menu was vast, with many different soup and lunch combination options. I wanted spicy, so that narrowed down my choices to just a few. I decided to try the "Tonkotsu" style of soup. While I was waiting, my server brought me some delicious Green Tea, and a glass of water. It's nice to receive tea without a charge, and also without having to ask.

Tonkotsu is a thick pork bone broth based soup. I found out from my server that they use the pork hip bone, pork meat, and also infuse the soup with apples (her accent was thick, at first I thought she said eyeballs). The broth ends up being very hearty, white in color, with a slightly creamy consistency, yet it doesn't taste heavy.

When the soup arrived it was arranged with noodles on the bottom, slices of Japanese mushrooms, slices of pickled ginger, a brown "mystery" egg (I suspect it was Duck), slices of BBQ style pork, green onions, bean sprouts, and a pile of orange and red colored chili paste. As with other asian style soup lunches, it's best to "go at it" double fisted. I prefer chopsticks in the right hand for the noodles and the meat, and an oriental style spoon in the left hand for the broth.



I've had Vietnamese noodle soup plenty of times, but it is a little bit more straight forward. I was confused as to if I was supposed to stir it all around or what. The server, who could obviously tell I was a "Noob" helped me out and yes suggested that I give it a good stir, which is what I did and what you can see in the picture.

The soup tasted amazing, there were many different flavor combinations, and it was indeed spicy. I'm already planning another trip back there next week, I want to try their spiciest offering, the BBQ Beef Stew.

I consider my seach of spicy food to be complete when I can get a good sweat going on. I know I have reached the top of the mountain when I have driplets of sweat that form behind my ears and run down the back of my neck. A Japanese woman was there to pick up an order to go, she was very polite, but I saw her look and laugh at me a little bit. With my mouth open and patting my head with a napkin like I was coming in from the field or something, I'm sure it was amusing.

Osaka Ramen is a fantastic place to try Ramen for your first time. The restaurant was clean, the service suberb, the food excellent, and it was a value, $10 including tip!!

Visit them at:
http://osakaramen.com/index2.html