Ottawa Foodies

I treasure the ramen at Totoya, too. Now, let me qualify that it's not the best I've ever had, and it's wayyy too expensive at $12, but like you said, Duckfat, there's only one ramen source in Otown and we gotta keep it in business! It's too bad ramen's so rare here, because it's one of my fav Japanese dishes. This summer I gorged on it while on vacation in Calgary and Vancouver. There's ramen at restaurants all over the place in these cities for under $10. Those lucky westerners!

Here is the Totoya Ramen, which I finally got around to trying while spending a fun father-and-son half-day in the Market with my two year old. I quite enjoyed the soup except that the broth seemed kind of boring -- basically simple dashi with a heavy dose of soy sauce. To spice things up, they offered a shaker of pre-ground pepper rather than the chili-sesame-orange sprinkle that has accompanied udon/soba soups at other Japanese restaurants. I don't know if this is a universal difference between ramen and udon/soba or if the shaker of black pepper is unique to this restaurant. I do make a tastier broth for breakfast at work using chicken bouillon powder, tom yum paste, sesame chili oil, dried chives, and fried onions, but then I don't call it ramen. ;-)

As for the other ingredients, the noodles were excellent and I especially liked the pink slivers of pickled ginger. The homemade BBQ pork wasn't my thing -- in fact, when I first bit into it my impression was of a tough slice of overcooked salmon.

Is there another place in Ottawa where you can get authentic ramen? If so, I haven't found it. The sushi I've had at Totoya has been just okay, but the ramen is fantastic: chewy fresh noodles topped with homemade BBQ pork, hard-boiled egg, seaweed, bamboo shoots, spinach and pickled ginger, in a super-tasty soy-based broth. I've eaten ramen at noodle counters in Tokyo, and this stuff would hold its own. It is, unfortunately, not cheap--about $12 for a big filling bowl--and available only at lunch time. But it's worth it. I'm also a bit worried that this place might not stay in business for long--it's often empty or near empty when I've gone. I would hate to lose my ramen source, so I encourage everyone to go slurp a bowl!