In- Yo Dinner

July 22, 2011

Friday night

  

Tonight, we went to Ajisen Ramen house at the 3^rd floor of Robinson’s Place, Manila. 
                                           

                                                                  

Noodle soups do not appeal to me before.  I thought they’re kind of boring and you only eat them when you’re sick.  Noodle soup is the last thing that I will order in a Japanese restaurant.  I have always loved maki, sushi and tempura. They are the usual suspects in my Japanese dinner ensemble.  

  

Seafood Ramen and Ajisen Ramen

I am trying Japanese ramen for the first time in real life.    










When I took my first soup spoonful, my mind uttered, “Wow! This is so good, as in this is sooooooo goooooood!  Why did I not try this before?  Now I understand why Naruto loves ramen so much.”

The house specialty, Ajisen Ramen, has a broth that tastes so good, I could say it is such a comfort food.  It has thin strips of pork, slices of century egg, threads of fungus and cabbage leaves.  We cracked jokes on the fungus.  I put some chili powder on the ramen and the effect is energizing.  The heat of the chili made me exhaled, a good breathing exercise I must say.  I’m not sure if I was just hungry because I skipped my PM snack.  But no, this ramen is truly good.  It soothed away my tiredness after a week’s work.   I didn’t know that a hot ramen could be a therapy for a hardworking employee.  :)

Then I tried the Seafood Ramen, the bowl was just neighboring at the tip of my elbow.  It has a lighter flavor but the broth still has that peculiar taste of the Ajisen Ramen’s.   I think all the ramen noodle soups in this Ramen house have the same broth base and only differ with the toppings.   

We also had the crunchy roll, a maki that has crispy breading.  Aside from the usual mango and nori, the roll of sticky rice got soft melted cheddar cheese in the center.  And I could trace some mayo.  I adore mayo!  Needless to say, I like it.  

The thin slices of chicken teriyaki is just light, just enough for my little tummy.  I kept on licking the authentic Japanese teriyaki sauce that each chicken slice left on my lips.      
 

 After our Japanese dinner, we went to Caramia at the 2nd floor for gelato.  

Caramia also has gelato cakes but we settled for the gelato ice cream.  Gelato is such a cold sweet contrast to the hot salty ramen.

 

Dinner and dessert tonight were respectively hot and cold, the yin and the yang--light and darkness.  In life, there's a balance of light and darkness.  Since the yin and the yang are Chinese in origin, I wondered what the Japanese call the yin and the yang.  So to satisfy my curiosity, I did a little research.  In Japan, the dual qualities of ‘yin’ and ‘yang’ are known as ‘in’ and ‘yo’, respectively.  ‘Inyodo’, meaning ‘The Way of Yin and Yang’ is Japanese feng shui.`  A little trivia that's sparked by the ramen.