What do you do when you can't find a decent bowl of ramen anywhere in London? If you're Emma Reynolds and Ken Yamada, you open your own restaurant
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The restaurant voted top for cheap eats by our readers happened for the best of reasons: the greedy people who set it up wanted to eat there. "We couldn't find a decent bowl of ramen in London," says restaurateur Emma Reynolds. So she and her business partner Ken Yamada went on a research trip around Japan, eating three bowls of the stuff a day, and returned with plans. They had fallen in love with tonkotsu ramen, made by simmering piggy bits for up to 18 hours to produce an unctuous milky stock of uncommon depth and richness.
In 2007 they opened Tsuru, a Japanese canteen selling good value sushi and katsu curry. It was closed on Saturdays, so they opened for a few weekends in a row simply to sell ramen. "The last Saturday we sold 120 bowls," says Reynolds.
In June 2012 they opened Tonkotsu in Soho. For around £10 you get the stock, which took months of research to get right. There's the noodles, of course, made using their own machine imported from Japan. There's the long-braised pork belly, and the pots of their extraordinary chilli oil. Most of all there's customer acclaim. "I still can't believe people are queuing out the door," says Reynolds, who's just opened a second, pop-up Tonkotsu in east London. Quality will out, especially when it's a bargain.
Tonkotsu, 63 Dean Street, London W1D 4QG; 020 7437 0071