Had a ramen craving recently so we decided to hit up G-men for dinner. Now G-men is located on Alexandra, so that undoubtedly means if you're going at a busy time like 7pm, you're going to have a bad time looking for a parking spot! Took me so long to find a spot, I ended up settling for street pay parking. Their lot at the back of the restaurant is packed full, and then some, meaning all those illegals parked in the driveways of the parking lot where there is no actual spot.
Luckily the rest of our group had already got a table inside, so I was able to join them right away. If you don't have someone grabbing a table ahead of time, the wait is likely half an hour or more!
My go-to choice for ramen is always a miso flavour broth, so I ordered the Tonkotsu Miso Ramen $9.50 with added Ajitama (Marinated Egg) $1.50 and Butter & Corn $2.50.
Their presentation is definitely on point, as this ramen is plated very nicely. Once I got into it however, the flavour surprised me. I was shocked to find that this ramen was NOT as good as Ramen Izakaya Okawari! It was immediately evident that the soup was a lot thicker and way more concentrated than the one from Okawari. This made for a very overwhelming flavour for the ramen, and I would not drink the soup straight up. The noodle of the ramen was also very hard and did not absorb the soup's flavour well, which made it a lot less enjoyable to eat. The egg, albeit looking very nice in the picture, did not taste as good as the egg from Okawari, which I RAVED about. The cha shu pieces here were smaller and also did not have the same flavour as Okawari's. This was almost a direct comparison with Okawari as I had just been there recently, and this ramen did not impress me as much as I thought it would. The butter and corn which cost an extra $2.50 definitely helped make this taste better, but I would probably not add that on next time, as the overall ramen was not that much better with it added. G-men provides "condiments" on the side to add into your ramen about 1/3 in, and then more at 2/3 in, and I actually added some garlic to this to give it a little kick, hoping to flavour it up, but it was not very noticeable.
The rest of our party also had very similar ramen:
The service here is good, as with most Japanese restaurants. Our water was refilled almost without us asking, and service overall was very quick and friendly.
Overall, the ramen is not bad on its own, ignoring the comparison with Okawari, but it just wasn't living up to the hype of this place as much as it used to. Maybe this was a one off, or maybe G-men is slipping, as Okawari will be my first choice when opting for ramen in Richmond from now on!
Food:
3/5
Service:
3.5/5
Price:
$-$$
Overall:
3.25/5
Let me know what you think of this review, and whether it was perhaps a one off. Thanks for reading everyone, munch on!
- Phil
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