Toranoko in Maruyama

by Daz
(Sapporo)

This is the first ramen shop I went to in Sapporo due to it being right around from my house. The day we moved in we went for a walk around the neighbourhood to see what was there for eating and stumbled upon this little place, with a sign outside saying "SPICY RAMEN". A little intrigued, we went in. Having been up to Sapporo on vacation and tried the soup curry I was excited to find a curry ramen shop, I thought that the combo of a fragrant, spicy-curry like tonkotsu broth paired with the kinked ramen noodles that are popular in Sapporo was a no brainer.....they seemed to just go together! There are 2 kinds of their spicy ramen, Tora-no-ichi and Tora-no-ni, the difference being the level of spicy curry flavour, "ichi" is a richer curry flavour than "ni". They also sell just regular shio ramen and sho-yu ramen, but I just can't bring myself to try them in place of the delicious Tora-no-ichi! I always go for the stronger flavoured soup, I love the spice level, not too heavy, just enough to give it a fragrant, curry flavour. It also comes with a beautiful chunk of char-shu pork, that gets BBQ'd on one side prior to being laid on top of your noodles. This results in a nice criss-cross pattern of caramelisation on the pork that enables the milky fat to melt away in your mouth......its heaven!

If you are in the Maruyama area (hell if you're not, you should come over just for this!) then you should definitely seek this place out. Its on　Nishi 25 dori, between Minami 5 and 6, across the road from the Shinkoji shrine.