Raku ramen & izakaya review

menu and Raku Ramen logo

As I mentioned a few posts back, I am on a hunt for good ramen uptown Toronto. While typing in Google, Ramen in Markham, I was introduced to Raku Ramen & Izakaya. I think it is rare for places to be both Ramen and Izakaya because the target customers can be quite different for these 2 types of cuisine.

The food was delicious, Ramens were $8 and sushi entrees were about $10-13. It sounds pricey but seriously filling. Quality was quite good.

Service, however, was a bit disappointing. They close at 11:00PM (I went on a Friday night), we were kindly reminded that their last order was at 10:30PM (when we arrived at 9:45PM). At around 10:15PM they started to clean up by sweeping, bring out the garbage and moving boxes and items around. I found it very frustrating to eat while they were busily trying to clean up.

complimentary salad for everyone

Complimentary salad is served for everyone. Like most Japanese restaurants, this salad was made with an Oriental sauce salad. The salad was a little sour for my tasting.

Tonkotsu Ramen

Tonkotsu Ramen $8

Impression:

• Very rich brooth and slightly oily
• Served very hot
• Authentic BBQ pork perfectly marinated 
• Not fat or too thin bbq pork (just right)
• Lots of corn and bamboo shoots/sprouts (筍)
• Smaller serving 

This ramen was served on a pot, unlike most which are served on bowls. Unfortunately, the serving size was much less (despite it being a pot rather than bowl). The ramen was cooked properly and served very hot. They included a lot of "sides" to the serving (e.g. corn and bamboo shoots/sprouts (筍)). We really liked the BBQ pork because it was perfectly marinated and the ratio of fat and meat was good.

Raku Roll

Raku Roll - $13

ingredients:

• white fish (fresh)
• Tempura Bits (stale)
• Hot Sauce
• Grill Sauce
• Fish Roe
• Green Onion (fresh)

please excuse the bluriness of this photo

Impressions:

• old Tempura bits
• Refresh feeling
• Fresh fish
• hot

I guess from just looking at the pictures, you already want some of this sushi roll! It was good, the fish was fresh, the combination of grill sauce and hot sauce, and green onions. This tasted very authentic and good... It was near perfect... But I was deeply unimpressed because their tempura bits were not crunchy, I think they were a few days old.

You can tell when sushi was made by someone who was well trained or not by picking the roll up with chopsticks, moving it around and it does not fall apart! (While tasting "fluffy" and not hard and packed)

infamous ginger

apparently my friend was very happy with their ginger slices. They were very sweet and less hot than the usual ones.

I will be returning to this place because the food taste reasonably good, but seriously, they need much better service!

food score: 8/10
service/atmosphere: 6/10


website: http://www.rakuramen.ca/