Restaurant: McRamyun
Location: 1 Baldwin St, Toronto, ON M5T 1L1
Price Range: $$
Overall: 1.5/5
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*Update: The store have been forced to change the name from McRamyun to Mo’Ramyun. Check here for more details.
McRamyun is a newly opened restaurant, replacing Yakitori Bar and joined the restaurants strip on Baldwin Street :). As expected from the name, the main focus of McRamyun is Korean ramen and the chefs incorporate the inexpensive ingredient with some traditional Korean dishes. For instance the Mc Chicken Wings are coated with crispy ramen noodles and then deep fried. They also serve asian-fusion dishes as well, such as Corn Cheese ramen which looks like another version of a carbonara pasta. Although the concepts sounded interesting, my friend and I decided to try their originals ramyun instead.
The restaurant is quite spacious with a patio outside, but be aware that they will not allow alcohol on the patio! Interestingly I have passed by this place so many time during dinner, and there were either 2-4 customers or none at all. Anyhow, the restaurant was nice and relaxing, they also offer free wifi and service was attentive.
Right away you can tell that the noodles are instant/from packages, which is understandable from the “McRamyun” name, but this along with the price are why I had a problem with this place.
You see, if a restaurant is going to charge $8 – 13 for a bowl of instant noodles, then there better be some gold flakes or luxurious ingredients come with my bowl of soup. Why should I pay more than $10 for something that is easily made at home for less than $5, and perhaps even more flavourful?
The ramyun were decent sizes, probably enough to be shared by 2 people. All the ingredients were done right and were ah-okay, not memorable at all. Although the soup had the right level of spiciness, the broth was extremely bland and had no flavour. Albeit it is definitely healthier compare to those packaged seasoning, but I rather have some of that than drinking a bowl of water and noodle.
Would I come back to McRamyun and give it another chance? Probably not. Unless someone is able to drag me here and try the deep fried chicken, or their Asian-fusion dishes. Other than that, I can’t seem to find any reason to justify the $10 price tag for a bowl of ramyun in McRamyun at all.