Restaurant: Silver Lake Ramen
Location: 2927 Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90026. (323) 660-8100
Date: July 31, 2015 & September 13, 2016
Cuisine: Japanese Ramen
Rating: As good a Tonkotsu ramen as I’ve had
My friend Sebastian really wanted me to try Silver Lake Ramen, which is a well liked member of the new cadre of Tonkotsu (Hakata) places in LA.
The storefront is REALLY not much.
On busy Sunset Blvd, not far from Thai Town.
The menu consists of a few ramen, the toppings, and some nice greasy appetizers.
What would ramen be without Japanese beer? It is, after all, a drinking food.
Yuzuaide. A delicious slushy of yuzu juice (lots of) sugar and mint.
Sunomono. Cucumber crab salad. This one was fine, but not nearly marinated enough for my taste. I like the sweet tangy typical Sunomono marinade.
Fried chicken. Hot and delicious.
And they really mean fried.
Spicy tuna toast. I never saw THIS in Japan. Tasty enough, but so California.
Gyoza. Some of the best fried gyoza I’ve had in LA.
Vegetarian ramen. Extra veggies. I would never order this, it’s against my creed, and it looks more like a salad than a ramen. But it floats some people’s boat. The broth was good for vegetarian, very miso.
Tonkotsu ramen. Now this is the real deal. A big slab of pork belly, soft, although not quite as good as Tsujita’s. I added bamboo shoots and left out the bean sprouts. The noodles were nice and the broth was fabulously smooth. I cut the grease with a hefty dose of vinegary gyoza-sauce (I like it that way) and stirred in the chili paste. Really a delectable broth.
Shoyu ramen. Chicken broth with special soy sauce and green onion, bamboo shoots, spinach, dried seaweed.
Tsukemen dipping noodle. Thick pork and fish broth with green onion, spinach, bean sprouts, seaweed, egg and pork belly. Now Tsujita is the benchmark Tsukemen. This was good, but a bit different. It was rich, but not quite as rich, with a stronger seafood flavor that was quite nice. The noodles weren’t quite as eggy/good. The pork more pork belly/bacon. Still a very good ramen.
Silver Lake Ramen was as good a Tonkotsu as I’ve had in LA, and all the apps were really tasty. But it’s far far east for me and there are lots of great Westside ramens like Tsujita, Tatsu, Jinya. So if you live or travel out east, by all means get your noodles on.