Stopped by Samurai Noodle and Ramen Bar Ichi while I was in Houston for the holidays. For the record, I think Ramen Tatsuya has some serious flaws and I’m not a fan. Noodles are limp and gross, while the broth has this lingering unpleasant rotten funk on the aftertaste. I’ve tried hundreds of bowls of ramen over the years and while there’s some that are pretty heavy on the fatty stuff, I just feel absolutely terrible after having a bowl at Tatsuya.
Also, just my pet peeve that a lot of ramen shops don’t let customers specify how they want the noodles done, so I picked these two places since they’re known for noodles made in house.
Extra firm at Samurai Noodle was exactly what I wanted, wish the rest of the bowl were as stellar. Better than Tatsuya for sure.
Ramen Bar Ichi’s ajitama (the soft boiled egg) is comparable to some of the best eggs I’ve tried in Japan. All around, I found Ramen Bar Ichi to have the more solid bowl! Broth was rich yet still clean easy to drink. They also had a TON of green onion in their ramen.
