Marutama Ra-Men

I am so over the hot weather we've been having this summer. It's really been impeding on my ramen intake, as I've been way too hot to even think about slurping down a hot bowl of noodles. A couple weeks back we had a brief reprieve from the heat, so a friend and I hit up Marutama Ra-Men for lunch.

There always seems to be a line-up at this place during lunch hours. We put our name down on the list that permanently sits outdoors, but were seated within 5 - 10 minutes. Jinya Ramen used to be in this same location, but has since moved down the street and been replaced by Marutama. The menu here seemed a lot less varied, yet with similarly high prices like Jinya.

Tamago Ramen (Signature Bowl)

I went with Marutama's Signature Bowl, which comes with two pieces of their cha shu (braised pork) and marinated egg (Ajitama). The yolk of the egg wasn't runny, but wasn't quite hardboiled either - very flavourful. The cha shu was delicious, super tender & flavourful! I also appreciated that the noodles were not overcooked and had a nice bite to them. Unfortunately, the broth fell totally flat for me. As what I'd argue to be the most important component, the broth was pretty "meh" and as a result caused the whole bowl to feel like it wasn't worth the price.

Will I be back? Probably, simply because it's so close by if a ramen craving hits me while I'm at work. Though Jinya is pretty close too... and I haven't tried Ramen Gojiro yet...