Hakata Ramen @ Fountain Valley 新撰组

The other day me and my colleague were heading to a Vietnamese restaurant in Fountain Valley, but was disappointed to find out that they were closed for lunch. Another perfect example of how you should always check before you do something lol. But the good thing is, I remember this ramen place in Fountain Valley where every one of my friends who has been there said was really good. So we just went! I’ve been to the barbeque place right next door. That one was good too, feels very Japanese :p I like places that have that kind of “foreign” feeling.

Anyway, the place is called Hakata Ramen (Shin-sen-gumi). The moment I entered, I kind had this bad feeling that how come I’ve never been here before…It was crowded, but matched the perfect picture of a Ramen place in my mind J The selections were actually not that many. We got distracted and talked about the power of customization and how everything is becoming “Micro” addressing individuality. Anyway, we then ordered a fried noodle dish and a pork soup ramen combo with fried rice, which turned out to be too much for us (people are trying to lose some weight here, never mind if you can eat two bowls of ramen without a blink :).

They have a piece of paper that you need to fill in for your order. It basically turns a customization process into a standardized one, by naming the columns how much oil you want in your soup (light, normal, strong), how much flavor you want for your soup base (light, normal, strong), etc. We chose light for the oil and normal for the flavor. Turned out to be great. The soup was not oily at all and felt very natural (opposed to the heavy creamy soup base in Mitsuwa or Class 302). Compared to Mitsuwa, the noodle portion is large, definitely fed me well. Like other Japanese places, they have hand-written dessert menus posted on the wall. We were really full so didn’t try any (I really wanted to try some though), so maybe next time!

Shin-Sen-Gumi Hakata Ramen
http://www.yelp.com/biz/shin-sen-gumi-hakata-ramen-fountain-valley
18315 Brookhurst St
Unit 1
Fountain Valley, CA 92708
(714) 962-8971
http://www.shinsengumigroup.com