Hakata-Maru Ramen, Chatswood

To be honest, when I first came to visit Hakata-Maru Ramen, I got lost. This inconspicuous restaurant is not visible from Chatswood station and you would be lucky to notice it if you caught a bus from the bus interchange directly outside or opposite the restaurant. Also, the corner of Victoria St (i.e. directly across from the Chatswood Interchange/The District) is numbered 457 and to its right is 465 (The Avenue) - hence one would assume that 475 would be to the right of The Avenue. However, once you cross Brown Street, Victoria St turns into Railway Square and the street numbering changes. I ended up wandering around the area for over 10 minutes before double-checking with Google Maps (Zomato: your restaurant place-marker is incorrect!) to figure out that I had to go the other direction (to the left) before you hit 475... I was so happy when I finally found it!

Outside of Restaurant

Cutlery and Sides Available at Table

This is probably one of the more authentic Japanese restaurants that I have been to - pre-made ramen is stored inside a wooden box, waiting to be boiled and served to customers:

Boxes of Ramen

Kitchen with Large Vats of Soup and Pre-Made Chicken/Pork Cutlets

Even Ryo's just stores their ramen in large plastic boxes outside their kitchen. Also, their pork cutlets and karaage chicken appeared to be double-fried - i.e. pre-fried once beforehand, and left in a pile in front of the deep fryer until ordered, at which point the pork/chicken is deep-fried again to give it a crispy coating.

The menu here is rather extensive so it took much debate to decide on which ramen to pick - my final selection was the tonkotsu ramen, served with karaage chicken:

Karaage Tonkotsu Ramen ($14.80)

The tonkotsu soup was rather milky with minimal fat or oil, however it was sort of weird how they applied a hand-held blender to the vat of soup before obtaining a large scoop to pour over the ramen. The ramen was cooked to al dente and I was so happy to see that the bamboo shoots were fresh. The karaage chicken pieces still had their skin attached, allowing all the chicken fat/oil to seep into the chicken and maintain its moisture. The external batter was surprisingly chewy - like they used tapioca or glutinous rice flour - which is unusual for karaage chicken but as long as it helped deliver juicy, crispy chicken, I didn't really mind.

Visit #2

This time, I tried their signature Hakata-Maru ramen ($17.80), although with the frizzy ramen noodle (this normally comes with their straight ramen noodle but you can request to change it):

Hakata-Maru Ramen ($17.80)

Realistically, I had no idea what would be in this ramen, as no details were provided beyond a picture on the menu, so my expectations weren't high but I was seriously hoping it was worth its price tag. Upon arrival, I could discern that there was: Chashu (sliced pork), whole egg, dried fungi, bean sprouts, bamboo shoots, spring onions, nori sheets, chilli bean paste, and black garlic oil. The soup (same as last time) did taste better with the additional black garlic oil and red chilli paste (although I didn't mix the paste into the soup until the end, at which point the soup got really spicy). The sliced pork was absolutely divine - there were five gloriously thick slabs of rolled pork (belly?) with layers of glistening, translucent fat on top of the ramen:

Close-up of Ramen

Personally, I prefer the straight ramen noodle - the frizzy version reminded me of the Chinese dried thin egg noodle, which also has a distinct lye water taste *shudders*.

Overall, the Hakata-Maru ramen was good and would definitely recommend it. Considering the volume served and the inclusion of items that would normally cost extra as add-ons (especially for additional slices of pork), I guess you could consider this value-for-money but it's probably something to try/eat once in a while. I shall forever have fond memories of the pork...