| rev:text
| - i found out about this ramen joint through an article emailed to me by Eater Vegas. Did some search online right away and found very good reviews. The joint is much closer to me than Monta, is owned by the same group of talents behind Bachi Burger, and haven't been back to Monta since they were shut down by the Southern Nevada Health Department for incurring 47 demerits. They were reinspected and have reopened since, however.
This ramen joint is pretty much not very visible and is tucked almost at the back and the very end of the same building where Bachi Burger is at. Considering the strip mall's big parking lot, parking that day was a bit hard because it was lunch time, duh!. There was a line outside, and more people waiting inside. It's a relatively small, typical of ramen joints, with 7 (i think, that what I counted) tables and the counter bar but way bigger and feels more welcoming than Monta's. The kitchen is not as visible as Monta's. There's a 5 feet tall wall that separates the bar and the kitchen.
I was able to sit right away since I chose the bar and didn't have to sign up and wait. I realized that aside from the people waiting to be seated, there were also people coming in to pick up phone orders. This place was busy!
There were a couple of wait staff, both very friendly Latinos, and since there's a wall obstructing the kitchen view, i wasn't sure if the cooks were too. The clientele that day was a mixed crowd, mostly I assumed, workers from around the area on their lunch breaks. The joint's ambience is very cozy and relaxed, very clean and bright, minimally but tastefully decorated. Much better than Monta's for sure.
As i sat down, I was given a bottle of carbon-filtered chilled water and a shot glass. I ordered the chasu rice bowl, and for a change, I ordered their Butasan Ramen instead of Tonkatsu Ramen.
The breakdown: Chasu was grilled alright, but found them to be more fat and there was hardly meat in them. Again, I will never order rice bowls, ever, when I go to ramen joints. Lesson learned.
Tonkatsu Ramen is my peg when critiquing a ramen joint. I should've ordered tonkatsu but I ordered Butasan aka as Heavenly Pork Chasu which has two kinds of pork preparations in it, a slice of braised pork cheek (fat), and a slice of stewed pork belly (fat), ni tamago (boiled egg) and the usual sliced scallions, bamboo shoots, mushroom and with nori strips. I could only assume the broth for both tonkatsu and butasan are the same. It tasted porky alright but a bit one dimensional. I didn't taste the usual layering of flavors and that umami kick. The noodles are the same thickness as Monta's but a bit bland. I wish they were a bit thicker. And the pork? they're mostly, if not all fat. The friendly wait staff asked me if I wanted some condiments and I said no because I didn't know what they were, or if I would get charged extra for them. I should've said yes, in retrospect.
The verdict: Well, the place is new, relatively new, fairly new, so there will be a lot of growing pains and improvements to be had. The food are competitively priced, and very passable, not the very best , but certainly edible. I will surely go back and try their other ramen concoctions, specifically the lobster miso.
Note: I found out that they have frequent visit card (10 visits, get 1 free) but it wasn't offered to me :(.
|
![[RDF Data]](/fct/images/sw-rdf-blue.png)
![[cxml]](/fct/images/cxml_doc.png)
![[csv]](/fct/images/csv_doc.png)
![[text]](/fct/images/ntriples_doc.png)
![[turtle]](/fct/images/n3turtle_doc.png)
![[ld+json]](/fct/images/jsonld_doc.png)
![[rdf+json]](/fct/images/json_doc.png)
![[rdf+xml]](/fct/images/xml_doc.png)
![[atom+xml]](/fct/images/atom_doc.png)
![[html]](/fct/images/html_doc.png)