Authentic Ramen at Shoryu Manchester

In Manchester, you can speed travel to Japan within seconds, by visiting the Shoryu Ramen Restaurant. Entering from Piccadilly Gardens Guests are welcomed with a drum noise by the friendly staff while they shout ‘Irasshaimase‘, the Japanese way of wishing you a warm welcome. As the name might already tell, Shoryu Ramen offers Ramen and other various side dishes. The small Restaurant chain opened several years ago in London, with 6 Restaurants across Town, and only one outside the Capital City, in Manchester. Perfectly located you can reach Shoryu Ramen conveniently by public transport or by foot. Luckily the Restaurant was just across my Hotel in Manchester.

Enjoying authentic Ramen has nothing to do with the very cheap Ramen packets you can buy at supermarkets or speciality stores. After having had quite a few of those curly ramen with almost tasteless broth at Home, the Ramen by Shoryu completely changed my mind and taste buds. 9 Ramen dishes are on the Menu, most with pork belly, one meatless and one with chicken. You can check out the Manchester Menu, including the Prices, on their website. For Inspiration you can check out Shoryu’s Instagram Page as they repost and publish a lot Pictures of their Food. As a vegetarian, I went for the ‘White Natural Ramen’ (£11.50), Edamame (£3.90) as a Side and besides a 0,33l mineral water (£2.50) the ‘Slim Matcha’ (£7.00) convinced me.

The Slim Matcha is a drink made with coconut water, lime, mint, cucumber, matcha and filled with slimline tonic. It was very refreshing and if it is your first time drinking something with Matcha, don’t be shy, Matcha is finely ground, high-quality green tea. If you are unsure about products or dishes mentioned on the menu, at the back of it you can find a Glossary explaining everything. Foodwise the Edamame arrived first. Edamame are fresh green soybeans, seasoned with sea salt, that you can basically snack during any time of the day. Honestly, this was my first time eating them, after seeing so many pictures of them on Instagram and where else not, people always seemed to love them. I can only agree, Edamame is super delicious, even though one portion was quite too much just for myself with Ramen as the main dish.
When ordering Ramen at Shoryu Ramen Manchester you can choose them harder or, more al dente, softer. I went for what the friendly staff suggested, still with some firmness and definitely not overcooked.

Ramen Dishes at Shoryu Ramen are served in big bowls, with chopsticks and a ladle. My meat-free ‘White Natural’ Ramen Dish came in a creamy milky broth made out of ‘unique tonyu soy milk’, miso, konbu & shiitake, with straight ramen noodles and as toppings I had atsuage fried tofu, kikurage mushrooms, spring onion, menma bamboo shoots and nori seaweed. Luckily Shoryu Manchester was visited by many Japanese people, isn’t this a very good sign, so I could watch how they eat their ramen. You can start drinking the broth, or start right off with eating the Ramen with your chopsticks. To avoid uncontrolled swinging of the liquidity ends of each ramen noodles it’s recommended to come close as possible with your mouth to the bowl and to slurp the noodles gently. How exactly you eat your Ramen doesn’t care in the end, as the Taste is what should dominate your food experience. And how did it taste divine! I haven’t had anything comparable before and I’m now definitely hooked on authentic Ramen! The noodles were perfectly cooked, the broth silky and not too dominating, so the toppings could take over the various tastes. The next time, at one of their various locations in London, I will definitely add some extra toppings to my ramen, such as a sous-vide egg (£2.50) and/or Red Ginger (£2.00).
Have you ever had authentic Ramen, how did you like it?