The new Ramen Bar (Facebook page) on the 4000 block of Locust Street makes pretty good ramen, but I’m not convinced the awesomeness of the broth is enough to overcome my disappointment with the experience of dining there. Certainly the place is attractive: it’s packed with young people and the wooden tables, classy utensils and open kitchen give the feel of an authentic Japanese noodle bar. The hard, clean, high-ceilinged environment (and two TVs and a loud sound system) also means you have to shout a lot, which can be invigorating. And of course the place is new, so the service is bound to improve. However, the food and the prices will probably stay the same.
My friends and our daughters went as a group of six and were seated quickly at about 6:15 on Sunday night. The bar isn’t serving yet, but we weren’t drinking. We ordered several kinds of ramen and a couple of appetizers. The seaweed salad ($5) was bright green but barely seasoned and the shrimp shumai ($6) was almost as good as Trader Joe’s frozen shumai, but not quite. I was underwhelmed by the Takoyaki ($6), fragments of octopus balled up in fried dough and served with what tasted like fast food barbeque sauce. We would have been better off skipping all three.
We chose from a variety of ramen, plus optional, separately priced toppings including Ajitma ($1 marinated boiled egg – perfectly cooked) and Chashu ($3 marinated pork – just OK, not so easy to chew). Both the vegan and non-vegan versions of Veggie Miso Ramen ($8) featured rich, deliciously flavored broth. The noodles were bouncy and filling, and the vegetables mostly great, but we thought the corn niblets were weird. The signature Tonkotsu (pork bone) Ramen ($10) and its spicy cousin Kara Kara Tonkotsu Ramen ($12) were very satisfying, and will seem even more so on a snowy winter night. I was definitely happy with the ramen, and really happy about that yummy marinated egg.
For dessert, the kids ordered ice cream; they found the green tea ice cream ($5) too bitter (though I liked it). The red bean ice cream ($5) was sweeter. In the end, five bowls of ramen, one unremarkable fried rice entree, three appetizers, and three dishes of ice cream set us back $117.76. If the food and service had been impeccable, I would feel better about the prices. But the sad, meager appetizers, random service, and especially the automatic 20% gratuity (for a table of six) made me feel like I was missing something. And I realized that what I was missing was Tampopo (269 S. 44th Street), which is less fancy but more accessible if you are looking for ramen, seaweed salad, and green tea ice cream.
Ramen Bar is currently cash-only. Lunch is served from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and dinner from 4 to 10 p.m.
– Jen
September 26th, 2012 at 4:41 pm
We LOVE to go to Tampopo! It’s BYOB and the food is always yummy. And they are not full-service – it’s more cafeteria-style & you have to bus your own table. So no mandatory tipping there, though it is definitely not uncommon for full-service restaurants to add a gratuity to tables of 6 or more.
I look forward to trying Ramen Bar, but for me, Tampopo will be hard to beat.
September 26th, 2012 at 4:51 pm
It seems they are closed on Mondays. At least they were closed this past Monday when I tried to eat there.
I agree adding gratuity in for a large table is not overly unusual. However I will skip the appetizers. Thanks fro the tip on that.
I find Tampopo just OK. IMO it is a bit overpriced, especially for a place without table service.
September 26th, 2012 at 11:51 pm
I think I’ll stick to the Vietnamese place at 43rd and Spruce or Vietnam cafe for my noodle soup fixins,
September 27th, 2012 at 10:49 am
Heck with that. I am a big tipper. When they auto-charge gratuity they get only that. When they don’t I give more. Their loss.
September 27th, 2012 at 12:03 pm
I’m with you, Happy Curmudgeon. We always over-tip. When the tip is included I’m like, Oh hey! We saved a few dollars.”
That being said, disappointed to hear the middling review but I will have to check it out for myself. I love when we get new restaurants in the neighborhood but it’s such a bummer when they fail to meet expectations. (I’m looking at you, Rimedio!)
September 27th, 2012 at 12:57 pm
I have to disagree with the quality of Ramen Bar, but the thing I take most issue with is the headline of this article.
The wording suggests a mandatory 20% tip, except that inside the review it explains its for parties of 6 or more. I’m not sure what reality any of you reside in, but gratuity on large parties is standard in the business. It is very common in large groups for individuals to tip less, and I’m sure the restaurant is using this completely standard procedure to address what might be an issue with a university crowd. Pretend to be outraged all you want, but if this is offensive to you, maybe you should look into a different line of writing work.
September 27th, 2012 at 2:38 pm
@Foodie About Town. Good point on the mandatory tip. That is misleading. We took it out of the headline.
September 27th, 2012 at 1:59 pm
I ate there for lunch today. Ehh…it was fine. I agree that the appetizers were mediocre at best. The noodle soup was good, but I had much better for cheaper elsewhere in the city.
I probably won’t go back. The prices aren’t worth what you get.
September 27th, 2012 at 2:51 pm
Steve, where can you get better, cheaper ramen in Philadelphia? Not being snide at all…definitely curious. We didn’t have any establishments making ramen up until a few months ago (with the exception of Morimoto). And I’m not a fan of most of the places I’ve visited so far.
September 27th, 2012 at 9:49 pm
I haven’t been to this place. The review sounded decent to me for a while– descriptive of the environment, food, etc– what I expect from a solid local blog. But then, one of my least-favorite Yelp-y tactics came into play, ala, “We spent X for X. $118 is a lot of money!”
But you know what isn’t a lot of money? Just under $20 a head for 3 appetizers, 5 entrees, and 3 desserts, WITH a 20% tip… a block from campus. If you don’t like paying over $100 to have dinner with your kids, stop taking them out to restaurants. Maybe I’m putting words in your mouth, but either way, if you count the kids as full patrons– which you obviously did based on your order– then it was $16 a head.
Roughly $98 pre tip (counting tax?)
+ tip (19) = $117
divided by 6 = $19.5
September 28th, 2012 at 9:07 am
Philly server–what you’re missing is that they thought food was less than the desired quality and the apps were small. $20/head isn’t that much at all but if you go to almost any restaurant around the area you get MUCH MORE for that. Compare to similarly priced places and you get insanely superb service and perfect portions.
Think Vietnam Cafe for example: 6 people walk in, have a great time with awesome service all around, and walk out with bags of leftovers. Similar cost, very different outcome/review. There are lots of great restaurants like that.
September 28th, 2012 at 11:18 am
@GoldenMonkey,
Ramen is not really a separate category for me. It falls into “Asian noodle soups”. My favorite place for this is the Pagoda Noodle Cafe on 2nd, right near the Ritz East. Price/quality wise in the West Philly area, I’d put Vietnam Cafe and Sang Kee as better, especially with regards to the appetizers.
October 2nd, 2012 at 10:19 am
Oh, gotcha. That’s understandable I guess, but having lived in Japan for 4 years, it’s completely its own animal in my mind.
FWIW, I’ve only been once and just for the apps. I thought they were great and more importantly, very Japanese (as opposed to Tampopo, which despite the Japanese name, is really more Korean). I cook most everything we eat, so the occasional splurge doesn’t bother me much.
If I may though, I realize this article is getting old, but I wish the author had visited multiple times and certainly not on a Sunday evening to draw an overall conclusion about the place. Additionally, a little more familiarity with real Japanese food (not just sushi) would have gone a long way. Corn is often found in ramen for example. Real Japanese ice cream has more matcha in it than the American version, which makes it more bitter. And takoyaki (octopus balls) sauce tastes like American bbq sauce because they share many of the same ingredients, including ketchup due to the post WWII occupation. Nonetheless, I’m glad to see a discussion about what hopefully will be a “permanent” spot for this restaurant. I can’t even count the number of businesses that have been there over the years.