O Ramen – Albuquerque, New Mexico

“Food, like a loving touch or a glimpse of divine power, has that ability to comfort.”
~Norman Kolpas

According to most online definitions, the term “soul food” defines the cuisine associated with African-American culture in the southern United States. In wide use since the 1960s, the term originated and came into heavy use with the rise of the civil rights and black nationalism movements. Though still most widely associated with the African-American culture, over the years “soul food” has become synonymous with basic, down-home cooking, especially of comfort foods…and as Cracked magazine puts it, soul food is “the real reason why white people like Cracker Barrel.”

While the term “soul food” has, by definition, been culturally limiting and exclusive, in recent years the term has been broadened to include other cultures, albeit with a prefixed qualifier. In 2011, for example, New Mexico Magazine’s celebration of the Land of Enchantment’s “best eats” included the category “New Mexican soul food.” It was a declaration that New Mexican cuisine can also feed and nurture the soul.

When my friend and culinary kindred spirit Nikko Harada used the term “Japanese soul food” to describe the food at O Ramen, it brought a broad smile to my face. It’s far too easy to get into a thought process rut and immediately think “sushi” (or worse, the knife wielding prestidigitation of teppanyaki restaurants) when contemplating Japanese cuisine. Nikko gets it. Like me, she craves the Japanese food with soul-warming qualities–those homespun, flavor-packed dishes everyone in Japan, from children to grandparents, craves.

So, just what is Japanese soul food? Think curry, tonkatsu, gyoza, tempura and the noodle dishes: soba, udon and especially ramen. This is Japanese comfort food, what Bon Apetit editor Matt Gross describes as “the earthy, fatty, meaty, rib-sicking, lip-smacking fare–the noodles and curries and deep-friend delights that millions of Japanese depend on everyday.” It’s food to gather around, food to share with friends and family…food that truly feeds the soul.

Nikko’s enthusiastic endorsement for O Ramen was so effusive, I had to visit immediately: “it is seriously the closest I’ve come to eating legitimate Tokyo-style ramen in quite a while. The only other place that came even close was a ramen place my cousin took me to in the St. Mark’s district in NYC.” My inaugural visit led to a second visit the following day with plans to return frequently. That doesn’t happen very often, but then not every restaurant is as wonderful as O Ramen.

O Ramen is situated in the space which previously house Fei’s Cafe on Central Avenue across from the University of New Mexico. Students expecting the microwavable noodles in a Styrofoam cup that constitutes the typical student diet (along with burgers, pizza and beer) are in for a surprise. From a culinary, if not necessarily aesthetically, standpoint, it’s as authentic and traditional as a ramen house in Japan. The open kitchen, closed proximity seating ambiance at the 35-seat restaurant is more contemporary than it is traditional, but it’s not the ambiance that feeds the soul at O Ramen.

Feeding the soul is the bailiwick of owner Kenny Wang and his staff. Himself a former sushi chef, Kenny patterned his restaurant after ramen restaurants throughout Japan and in major metropolitan cities across the fruited plain. Though the ramen noodles are imported weekly from California, the broths are lovingly prepared in-house–with heart (as the movie Ramen Girl depicted, ramen has no soul until it’s prepared from the heart and not from the head). The process is painstaking, a labor of love.

The Tonkotsu (pork bone broth) is rendered from the long (18 hours), slow boiling of pork hocks, neck bones and other ingredients. This is a magnificent elixir, as soothing and comforting a broth as I’ve ever had. My friend Andrea Lin, the erstwhile restaurant critic for the Albuquerque Journal, calls it “liquid pork.” The porkalicious broth elevates the ramen noodles and miso to rarefied company, easily among the very best soups I’ve had. I’m in good company. Nikko calls it “some of the best ramen ever.” O Ramen is so good, I momentarily contemplated not sharing it with my readers for fear it will get too crowded and I’d have to wait for a seat.

6 January 2019: One of the O Ramen offerings which most excited Nikko is the Takoyaki which she thought she’d never have again without traveling to Japan or New York City. She described is as “awesome and perfect.” Takoyaki, a casual Japanese fast food appetizer, translates literally to “octopus fried,” but that translation short-changes it. Takoyaki are tiny, piping hot balls of fried batter stuffed with green onions, ginger and octopus (yes, octopus) and topped with a small dollop of mayo. A crispy exterior easily gives way to a gooey, addictively delicious interior. Available in small (four pieces) or large (eight pieces), this is a perfect precursor to the ramen.

6 January 2019:  O Ramen’s most popular offering is the Deluxe O Ramen (basic toppings, extra protein, corn, shiitake mushrooms, three pieces of nori and your choice of protein: pork, chicken, tofu or vegetarian).  Perhaps more than any other ramen offering on the menu, this one will remind you that for sheer purity of flavors, each element on a great dish of ramen should be well-executed and distinct so that flavors don’t joust for the attention of your taste buds.  Great ramen should be a composite, a harmonious whole.  By ordering this dish at a level four, I violated the marriage of balance between broth, noodles and toppings.  The Sriracha pretty much dominated the flavor profile, imparting enough heat to obfuscate other elements.  It’s akin to using too much wasabi on your sushi.  It’s a lesson learned.  Next time, it’ll be level one or zero.

24 April 2014: Ensnaring my affections most is the Tonkotsu Spicy Miso Ramen which combines a spicy miso with the house tonkotsu broth along with chashu pork, menma (a Japanese condiment made from lactate-fermented bamboo shoots), wood ear mushrooms, scallions, fresh ginger and a marinated boiled egg. Optional toppings include nori (seaweed) and corn. You can select the level of heat–from one to five–you desire, but Japanese soul food isn’t a test of heat tolerance as Thai food can be (even though the menu warns “Not responsible for burnt taste buds, but will take credit for full bellies.” You also don’t want the spice level to detract from your appreciation of the deep, soulful flavors of that magnificent broth and the ingredients with which it’s paired. For fellow aficionado Jim Millington, level three is perfect. The pork, though there’s relatively little of it, will make you swoon. The noodles inherit the unctuous flavors of the broth and may have you closing your eyes in appreciation. See where this soup ranks with my very favorite soups in New Mexico here.

Japanese curry arrived in the island nation courtesy of the British navy and was not, as widely thought, imported from India. Although that curry did have a strong Indian influence, Japanese curry in its current form is very different. Called Karē, it has a very thick, velvety smooth-textured gravy that’s sweeter and less spicy than Indian curries. Tadashi Ono, one of the authors of the wonderful book Japanese Soul Cooking contends the spices in Japanese curry “give you a high similar to sugar.”

That high is deliciously palpable in O Ramen’s curry which is served with with your choice of what Nikko describes as “panko fried goodness: tofu, chicken, potato croquette or pork” and is served with rice. The light, delicate panko crust and amazingly grease-free pork is amazing! As fabulous as the curry is, it’s a cultural faux pas (though entirely American) to request even more curry with which to flavor the rice because rice is itself considered a vital element of Japanese soul food. Call me an ugly American because I appreciate curry that good much more than the best of rice.

In its annual Food & Wine issue for 2017, Albuquerque The Magazine awarded O Ramen a Hot Plate Award signifying the selection of its Mini Pot (a dessert that looks like a potted plant) as one of the “dishes…that’s lighting a fire under the city’s culinary scene.” Considering the thousands of potential selections, to be singled out is quite an honor.

The third episode of season two of the Food Network’s Bite Club premiered on July 8, 2019. Dubbed “Duel in the Desert,” it pitted three of the Duke City’s most talented chefs–Kenny Wang of O Ramen, Marie Yniguez of Bocadillos Slow Roasted and Nabil Young of Safari Grill–against each other in a culinary competition to determine who would become hometown Bite Club champ. While all three superb chefs prepared truly outstanding dishes, at the end it was Chef Yniguez’s grandmother-inspired take on Hoja Santa scramble with chile-chorizo refried beans that prevailed.

O Ramen should perhaps be renamed “Oh, Ramen” as in “Oh, Ramen, how I love your soulful deliciousness.” Humble trappings aside, this was perhaps my favorite restaurant to launch in the Duke City in 2014.

O Ramen
2114 Central Avenue, S.E.
Albuquerque, New Mexico
(505) 243-3390
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LATEST VISIT: 6 January 2019
1st VISIT: 24 April 2014
# OF VISITS: 3
RATING: 22
COST: $ – $$
BEST BET: Tonkotsu Spicy Miso (Ramen), Curry with Pork and Rice, Takoyaki Balls, Deluxe O Ramen