Tonkotsu

Full review and photos can be found here: http://www.thecutlerychronicles.com/2013/04/tonkotsu-review.html Needless to say, that stuff is pretty life-affirming. Thumbs up.

I have been twice now and really enjoyed the ramen - better than I can remember anywhere else in London and would therefore highly recommend it. Would agree that the Gyoza are dry and a bit anaemic which is a let-down and loses it a star but as you can order extra noodles and egg it gets one back!

Not quite sure where all the posters below were eating but I suspect there are some other noodle bars in Soho which are jealous of this great little place. The food I had was wonderful. The noodles were authentic and the stock was think creamy and incredible. Ignore the haters, well worth the visit.

Biggest disappointment of 2012. I followed their progress leading up to the opening and was really excited by the prospect of a proper ramen place opening in London. The noodles were soft and clumpy and the broth was thin and lacked flavour. The gyozas were a joke. Dry, flabby and small... I am Japanese and grew up eating ramen. The bowls of noodles that come out of this restaurant do not do the real thing justice!

You know you're in trouble when you can sip the soup from the bowl straight away. It just wasn't hot enough, heat wise which is a terrible mistake. For £11 you really expect something special which this is not. I went once and when asked if I would recommend it, I'm afraid its a "No" from me.

Food was ok, tonkatsu stock was the best. Everything else mediocre. Service- disorganised and particularly rude at times, we requested a soup be shared between two bowls for our young children and were told that the chef was too busy to do this for us so we had to do this ourselves unceremoniously at the table (the restaurant was far from busy at 5.30pm). Will be going to the more authentic place around the corner in future as style seems to have overtaken substance,

I was so excited to try this place but was disappointed with the pork ramen. The broth tasted too fatty and I felt sick afterwards. Overrated and a bit of a rip off to be honest. I was more satisfied with a packet of tonkotsu pork instant noodles and at a cheaper price.

I’m Japanese and completely agree with your posts. Any Japanese would declare it as the worst tonkotsu they’ve ever tasted. It’s probably not worth to be called ‘tonkotsu’. Noodle was wrong. It should be thin and straight but very very crunchy. They instead used cheap one which was powdery when I started eating (undercooked) and meltingly soft by the end of meal (overcooked). Not the type for any soup noodle. Soup was wrong. Thin and bland as others already mentioned, and miles away from the gutty muscular heavenly soup which we expect in real tonkotsu stock. It tasted like they tried to mimic that by mixing commercial seasonings but failed. Karaage (deep-fried chicken) was made of tiny poor quality meat and excessive volume of breading around that. It tasted like I was eating deep-fried liver. Thank goodness the meat size was really small. Gyoza (fried dumpling) again came with very tiny filling. Together with the lack of texture and seasoning it tasted like there was no filling at all. One thing I want to comment is on the post below saying gyoza pieces came stuck together. This probably refers to the single crispy sheet-shape breading attached on top of 5 pieces. This is not common (first time I’ve seen in London) but possible and we call it Hane in Japanese (=wing). The purpose was to trap the meat juice escaped from inside the dumpling during the cooking, but in this particular case I suspect this rare method was used to hide the tiny filling and make the gyoza look bigger. Considering all the quality comments here, this place will not last long.

terrible ramen, noodle from the package and underwhelming soup stock. Order gyoza which came all 5 pieces stuck together in a lump, sent it back and staff argued that it is how gyoza are! astonishing. They fried another batch, which is exactly the same as before.

This place is a joke. Anyone with anything resembling a palate will walk away disappointed. The pot filled with bones out front misguided me into thinking the stock would be good - it was not. Thin, over-salted, lacking depth and complexity. The ramen was mediocre, with a texture that hinted at an origin in a supermarket. The pork belly was obviously thrown in straight from the fridge. The overall serving size was pathetically small. For £9, I'd rather go to Wong Kee in Chinatown for a bowl of noodles and give the remaining £5 to charity.