Off The Menu
Story and photo by Jack Barten
Traditional Japanese cuisine is not only an increasingly trendy genre in the global food scene, it’s also incredibly delicious. This past October, Thunder Bay was blessed with a new Japanese restaurant in the form of Sushi 7, and this month we took a look at their wonderful tonkotsu black ramen.
When this ramen bowl is first presented to you, you will no doubt be in awe. With wavy noodles, a marinated soft-boiled egg, pork belly chashu, black garlic oil, bean sprouts, green onion, and nori, everything one could ever love in a ramen is here. The base for all those aforementioned ingredients is a pork bone broth. To make the broth, pork bones are cooked down for over ten hours, making for a rich and deeply flavoured broth with notes of salt and smokiness. It gets even better with the pork belly chashu, which elevates all the other components, adds a great bit of texture, and further enhances the flavours of the broth. The bean sprouts and green onions break up the richness and keep the ramen feeling fresh and light. However, it’s impossible not to rave about the marinated egg. A Japanese marinated egg, also known as a ramen egg, is a soft-boiled egg typically marinated overnight in a sweetened soy sauce. This adds wonderful umami flavours to the ramen and will no doubt please the traditional ramen crowd.
Overall, every component of this ramen comes together to make for a comforting dining experience. The smoky and decadent pork flavours combine with the fresh vegetables to make for the perfect spring ramen dish. When you first venture to Sushi 7, it is easy to jump straight to their incredible sushi menu. However, their tonkotsu black ramen is not only a great reason to try something new, but it is also the perfect dish to get you through a Thunder Bay spring.
Sushi 7 is located at 1072 Oliver Road Unit 2 and can be contacted by phone at 807-767-2152.
