Tsuta at Funan

Tsuta opened a new branch at the newly opened Funan life-style mall.  In case you don't know, Tsuta is a Michelin 1-star Japanese ramen restaurant, it is very rare.  And this ramen restaurant is also mentioned in the 2019 Japanese drama Ramen Loving Girls special edition, so don't play play, this is a seriously famous ramen restaurant.

The Funan branch is not very big, probably with a seating capacity of 20-30 persons only.  It is small open concept kitchen is manned by a grand total of two chefs, both are local Singaporean/Malaysian Chinese.  I think they have a central kitchen somewhere where they prepare all the soup base, as I saw the chef scooping out the soup base from a stainless steel container, and I don't see any facilities for cooking the soup base.

Once you are seated, you can place your order with a sheet provided.  You can customize your ramen to your own liking.  The best part for me is I can choose the level of salt in the soup base.  Authentic Japanese ramen tends to have a very salty flavor, too much for me, so I am glad that here I can get a less salty option.

I ordered the teriyaki chicken soba.  The soup base is thick in flavor, but not as salty as the authentic Japanese soup base, I like it.  The ramen in this case is actually soba.  Compared with conventional ramen, it is more smooth, offers a clean sensation, and easy to bite.  To me, this soba probably is the crown jewel of this place.  The teriyaki chicken is not bad, tender and juicy.

I also tried their steamed gyoza (dumplings).  The gyoza skin is paper thin, and you can see the fillings inside.   It is not bad, but the fillings are a bit salty.  Too bad they don't give you an option to choose a less salty version.

In total, spent $26 for this simple meal.  The soba is good, enjoy the pleasant sensation very much.  

Santouka at Clark Quay Central

This is my second visit to this ramen restaurant in 8 or 9 years.  During my last visit, their ramen was way too authentic for me.  The soup base was so salty that it was unpleasant to eat.

Shio Ramen, $13.50++

This time, I ordered their Shio ramen.  The soup base was still as thick and milky, but the taste was a lot less salty.  I think they had made adjustment to their soup base so that it is more acceptable to the local taste.  It is also better from the health point of view.  Too much salt in a person's diet will have many serious consequences, including high blood pressure, diabetes and even stomach cancer.  Japan has one of the highest stomach cancer cases in the world, partially because of their diet.  It is great that they made the adjustment. 

Back to my Shio ramen.  The chashu was thinly sliced.  The proportion of fat and lean meat was good.  Melt-in-your-mouth element was still there for the fat part.

Ramen-wise, it was like our egg noodle, and I think it was slightly over-cooked, leaving the contour less clearly defined. 

Overall, their ramen was quite enjoyable, with good adaption to the local taste for the soup base.
The staff were friendly and service efficient.  If you choose your table correctly, you can enjoy the view of Clark Quay while enjoying your ramen too.

Tonkotsu Kazan Ramen at JEM

I spotted this new ramen shop in JEM recently.  They are specialized in Volcano ramen, which was really new to me, so I decided to give them a try. 

The shop is really just a hole in the wall kind of operation, although it is a much more 'luxury' hole in the mid-scale JEM shopping center.  The dining environment is very intimate (read 'cramped'), just like those ramen shops in Japan. 

On the table, you are given a 1-min timer and the instructions to handle the 'volcano'.  However, later on I found out that neither is useful.  The staff will handle almost everything for you, you can put your timer aside, and forget about the instructions. 

I ordered the Kazan Shoyu.  My ramen came in a pre-heated stone bowl, like those used in Korean bimbimban.  Then the staff poured about 1/4 of the soup base into the stone bowl, and put on the lid.  Hot stream gushed out of the inverted funnel furiously, just like an erupting volcano.   Haha...Now you know how it got its name, volcano ramen. 

A minute later, the staff removed the lid.  The ramen was piping hot, and the steam was still quite furious.  At this time, you were supposed to stir the ramen just as furiously. 

If you would like to know how strong the stream was, look at this photo.  My phone's camera lens was completely fogged up in less than a minute.  If you have kids with you, it is advisable for you to keep you kids in some safe distance. 

Next step is to scoop out some portions of the content to a small bowl for your consumption.  Now let's look at what we got in that 'volcano'.  Char siew, plenty of vegetables, including cabbage, bean sprouts, some slices of carrot and green pepper and onions. 

Their char siew is big and thick, unlike other ramen whose char siew are just very thin slices.  However, the texture of the char siew is quite uneven.  Some pieces were really nice.  It was tender soft although it was thick,  easy to bite, pleasant to eat.  Some other pieces tended to be very tough and dry, reminding me of sugar canes that had been squeezed out all of its juice.  Eating those pieces was like a tug of war between your teeth and the char siew. 

The ramen is pretty thick and strong, like a samurai.  The portion of ramen was quite small though, a few scoops later all the ramen was gone.  More than 50% of the content of that stone bowl were cabbage and bean sprouts.  If you like plenty of vegetables, it is a good choice. 

To judge whether a ramen is good, the first thing to test is the soup.  The soup here is very thick.  When the staff poured only 1/4 of the soup into the bowl, the taste was good, probably diluted by all the vegetables.  Later, the staff poured all the soup into the bowl, and that was the beginning of my misery.  The soup was TOO salty!  I think 50% or less will be good for me. 

My order also came with a bowl of plain rice.  You were supposed to pour the rice into the remaining reman soup and eat it together.  In my case, as I found the soup was way way too salty, I decided to eat the rice separately, with the vegetables, to lessen the saltiness.

On the table, they also gave me some eggs.  At first, I thought they were raw eggs for me to add into the ramen, but then I found out they were actually cooked eggs.  What are the eggs for?  No idea. 

Overall, I find it a pleasant experience.  In total, I spent $22.13, including service charge and GST.

Ramen Nagi at Suntec City

The media recently reported that the famous Tokyo ramen - Ramen Nagi, just opened its door right here at Suntec City, Singapore.  I have never heard of Ramen Nagi before, but as it is said to be a famous one from Tokyo, I must give it a try!

The address is Suntec City Tower 2, North Wing, #01-512/513, but actually it is not quite easy to find it.  First you have to find the north artrium, then you have walk OUTSIDE of Suntec City, and then turn back facing Suntec City, and then you will find it.

The interior deco is one of a kind.  Red, blue, yellow banners hanging down from the ceiling, at first glance, I almost mistook myself in a Tibetan temple.

The staff asked me whether it was my first time there, obviously yes.  Then he told me that there is a basket below every seat to put your bag.  Good, very safe :-)  And for ordering, I was given a sheet and a red pencil.  I had to decide which type of ramen, what kind of toppings and any extra, level of spiciness, etc.

My Ordering Slip

I decided to try their signature ramen, which is the Butao King.  I went for 'normal' for everything, and for spiciness, I also took the advise from the ordering slip to level 1 for 1st timer visitors.  For the pricing, I was actually very surprised that they charge $1.50 for extra green onions.

Ramen Butao King, $13.90+

My ramen came pretty fast after placing the order.  As usual, I tried the soup base first.  The richness level I ordered was 'Normal', so the soup was not as salty as those in 'authentic' Japanese ramen, which is a good point.  However, it was also a bit too diluted, the richness of flavor from the big bones somehow is lost.

The ramen itself was similar to our wanton noodle, thin and long.  It was firm, but not very chewy.  The portion was very small though, a few mouthfuls and it was gone, leaving me fruitlessly ploughing through the soup.  Spiciness of the ramen is determined by the amount of chili sauce they add to your ramen before serving.  Do you see that dark speck next to the red spoon in the photo above?  That was my chili sauce.  For level 1 spiciness, it was just a sting to your palates once in a long while.  And for some reason, the temperature of my ramen was rather uneven.  Some part of it was hot, some part of it was cold?

Last but not least, the pork shoulder.  I think it is the crown jewel of the ramen.  The portion was generous, about 4 pieces, where elsewhere you could only get 2 pieces without paying extra.  The shoulder meat was firm but not tough, easy to bite.

The dining environment may not be very comfortable if the place is almost full, as all the tables are crammed together, Japanese-style, leaving barely any space between you and the next diner.

Overall, Ramen Nagi serves decent ramen at a reasonable price.  If you have a sudden craving for ramen around the area, it can be a good choice.

Ippudo at Westgate

I have long heard of Ippudo serving very ramen, but never had a chance to give it a try, until last Sunday.  I arrived at their Westgate branch at 11am, when they just opened for the day.  I was ushered in immediately and seated at a table.

The interior design is very much Japanese style.  However, it is at least one class up compared to the usual ramen shops in Japan, where you find nothing more that a few seats at the counter, plus a couple of tables in a tiny shop.  Ippudo at Westgate is spacious, and elegant.

While waiting for my food, I did a search of Ippudo's history.  It is a shop first opened in 1985.  It is very young by Japanese standard, where there are many centennial shops.  They are famous for tonkutsu ramen.  Tonkutsu is Japanese word for pork bone.  Tonkutsu ramen means ramen served in pork bone soup which is usually boiled for hours.  The original intended patrons were people who do a lot of hard labour work.  Hence the tonkutsu soup tends to be heavy in salt.

Bonito Tonkutsu, $17.00

I ordered the Bonito Tonkutsu, a special dish only available in Ippudo Singapore.  The ramen used is not the normal Japanese ramen, rather it is a thin noodle, very much like the Chinese wanton noodle. You can choose how you like the noodle to be done, soft, medium, hard or very hard.  I chose medium.  It was just nice, not too hard, not too soft.  Easy to chew and digest, while still retaining some toughness.  Good!

The broth is made from both fish and pork bones.  Comparing with broth made from pork bones alone, the soup is less thick.  The fish brought out some refreshing freshness and sweetness, making it more appetizing.  As a special Singapore dish, the broth is a lot less salty than the normal Japanese ramen soup.  This adaptation is definitely good.

The ramen was served with one slice of pork belly, one slice of pork loin.  If you top up another $4.00, you can get additional one slice of pork belly and one slice of pork loin.  Other ingredients include bean sprouts, spring onion, bamboo shoot, and fried garlic.

Matcha Tiramisu, $7.00

I also ordered the matcha tiramisu as dessert.  Instead of coco powder, matcha power is sprayed on top of the cake.  I sometimes would choke on the coco powder, and that's reason why I don't like tiramisu so much, matcha doesn't have such a problem.

Matcha is bitter, the cake is sweet, so it is a bitter sweet experience.  My Italian colleague told me that tiramisu in Italian basically means "pick me up".   Whenever you are down, get a tiramisu, it will for sure life your spirit up!

At first, I thought the matcha powder is only on the top layer, but that's not the case.  They actually layered it through out the cake.  Thick layers of sweetness sandwiched between layers of bitterness. Hahah.... C'est la vie!

Service-wise, the staff there were generally friendly.  However, the waiter who served me was a bit rough, a very serious face throughout, not even a tint of smile.

Overall, I found the experience enjoyable.  The food was good, unauthentic but to my liking.  You can enjoy the good taste of Japanese ramen while getting rid of some of the unpleasant part.

Ganbatte, Ippudo!