Review of 'Bone Daddies'

A hot new ramen place in London? I am SO there! Oh well.

I had heard of this new New York-style ramen bar (an odd juxtaposition if I have ever heard) in the heart of the restaurant scene of Soho just off of Wardour Street. We walked past it at first but then made our way through the hanging fabric into the wood-floored restaurant crammed with tall bar stools and tables. We were early and chose to sit at the window overlooking the somewhat seedy but, admittedly, interesting Peter Street to watch the world go by with people looking in all the time (doubtless to figure out what the hype is all about…that or not knowing what to make of it!).

The menu is fairly simple with basically three parts: “snacks” (starters), “ramen” and, of course, drinks. We were talked into having the softshell crab “snack” (£8) which was very simply served deep-fried with a very spicy (and not exactly tasty) green chilli dipping sauce. Tasty but not the best I have ever had - Particularly dry since we did not want to have too much of the hot sauce! We also had the fried chicken (£5) which was simply served in a small cup in small pieces - Also nice, but a bit dry and lacking in a lot of taste for me (I am a fan of the Japanese method of marinading the chicken in sake then deep-frying - but this was not what was done here, and all the much poorer for it).

I went for the “Tonkatsu Ramen” (£11) for my main which is described as “..with spring onion, chashu pork (20 hour Pork Bone Broth)”. Quite a good depth of slightly sweet flavor but not really earth shattering. My date for the evening had the “Sweet 3 Miso Ramen” (£10) described as “…with corn, wakame, butter, chicken (Chicken Bone Broth)” which she found quite sweet as well and found the smell not very appealing (though she admitted it tasted better than it smelled). We both thought the noodles were under-cooked as they were al-dente - Fine for Italian, not so good in ramen.

The drinks were quite expensive with a small glass of “Oolong Tea” at £3 (nothing on the drinks menu was less than £2.50, and that was a small soft drink!) and my companion's ginger beer (ok, it was very NICE organic ginger beer) was £3 as well. The ginger beer had a nice kick to it too.

The youthful staff were probably the highlight of the visit - Friendly (one sat and talked to us for a few minutes before we had even ordered anything) and willing to point diners to the right places on the menu. Very helpful.

By the time we left at about 7 we could barely hear ourselves think with the place just hopping with people and not a free chair to be had. Not sure what they see here as there are better choices on offer elsewhere in London. We found the food overpriced, quite bland and uninspiring, though fresh and generously portioned. We might come back to give it another try but there are loads of other places I would love to try first.

Rating: “Not great, but not the worse”

Review Date: 2012-12-08

Cuisine: Japanese

Address: 30-31 Peter Street, London W1F 0AR ENGLAND

Public Transport: Piccadilly Circus

Location: London (England) - Soho

Map:

Telephone: +44 (0) 20 7287 8581

URL: http://bonedaddiesramen.com/