Ramen Santouka – Dinner

Tokusen Toroniku Ramen

If you’re at The Central and do not know what to eat your best bet would be the ramen. There are various shops specialising in ramen and during dinner hour, there would be long lines, but not to worry, the turnover rate is fast as ramen is essentially an “eat and go” meal.

I do not like marutama at all so we went to Santouka instead. They have another outlet at Cuppage.

Pork Gyoza – $6.00++

The gyoza was pretty good, better than most gyozas I’ve tried, including Ippudo’s. Do give it a try if you wish!

Tokusen Toroniku Ramen – $19.50++

This is the pork cheek ramen. The difference between this and the normal one is that they serve pork cheek instead of cha shu, and pork cheek is supposedly more tender, and has a greater quantity in terms of slices. The ramen itself cost $13.00++ or so on the menu, so I guess the top up of $6.50++ is for the meat. The cha shu ramen cost around $17 if I remember correctly. This is the regular sized ramen, and if you want it large, you +$2, and if you want it small you -$1. For the soup, I picked the miso based soup. They have shoyu and shio too. The soup was a bit too salty for me. They serving of noodles was quite generous too and I couldn’t finish, so I reckon that small size would be good enough for me. Just to note, they used the slightly squiggly variation of noodles which I do not prefer. I prefer the straight type like Ippudo’s or Tonkotsu King. Perhaps this is what Ashikawa Hokkaido style ramen is all about.

The pork cheek was really good though! It was very tender However, it was slightly too salty. The portion is quite big in my opinion, with 5 or 6 pieces there. 2 or 3 pieces would be enough for me.

The Hanjuku Egg comes at an addition $1.50++. It was cooked to perfection, and served at the optimal cold temperature, but it wasn’t as well flavoured as I would prefer it to be.

Here’s my rating of this ramen restaurant:

Soup: 7/10

Meat: 10/10

Egg: 9.5/10

If I compare it to Ippudo,

Soup: Ippudo

Meat: Santouka

Egg: Ippudo

Noodles: Ippudo

Oiliness: Draw

Price: Draw

In conclusion, this ramen is alright, but will not set me craving for more, unless I am craving for their crazy soft pork cheeks!