This downtown restaurant was on my list of "gotta try some day" restaurants in the burgeoning downtown Pittsburgh restaurant scene for a few months. I decided to check it out with a friend for lunch during the week.
There was some kind of building scaffolding on the sidewalk outside of the entrance which made it even harder to find. Thank goodness for the silver mailbox with their street number emblazoned on it or we might still be wandering around looking for the place. The doorway is sort of set back from the street in case you have trouble too.
We had no idea how cute the interior would be that greeted us. The chandelier above the bar is really beautiful and the color palette they used is calming and earthy. It's perfect for a ramen place. The hostess seated us quickly and the waitress took our orders within a few minutes.
We shared a pot of hot jasmine green tea that was very flavorful and the perfect temperature. Sometimes tea in those pots is just lukewarm and sort of bath tub temp range. Yuck. This was nice and hot.
The Ramen bowls were filled with flavor and different textures and the noodles were perfectly cooked. The 30 minute egg was packed with delicious flavors and was a brownish color, presumably from soaking in that amazing bath of broth. The pork belly and mushrooms just took the whole Shio Paitan Ramen over the top. Really tremendous bowl of ramen. My friend has the spicy Rayu Paitan which was similar to the Shio Paitan but carried a nice kick to it.
I would definitely like to try some of the other dishes and I hear they have a nice sake happy hour during the week. I mean, really, who doesn't like sake cocktails and delicious bowls of ramen after a long day at work?