Sho Spaeth is the lead editor and writer at ChefSteps and a former staff writer and editor at Serious Eats. He is also the author of the acclaimed cookbook Homemade Ramen, which explores how to make restaurant quality ramen entirely from scratch.
Kenchan Ramen is an outfit that sells mail-order, instant, fresh ramen kits. You receive a box with two frozen portions of ramen. Each portion consists of a serving of noodles, a seasoning packet, a couple of aromatic oils, toppings, and garnishes.
I don’t usually buy mail-order ramen kits. During the pandemic, I bought some mail-order ramen kits, like the ones offered by Nakamura and Ramen Ishida as a way to survive the restaurant closings, and I (of course) bought quite a few of the kits Ramen Shack (Keizo Shimamoto) was delivering. Other than that, they don’t make much sense for me, specifically, as I have homemade stock/tare/fats/noodles around at all times. I essentially make my own ramen kits all the time (and, of course, that’s sort of the theme of my forthcoming-some-time-god-knows-when cookbook).
However, Kenchan Ramen reached out to me to ask if I’d like to try their products, and, after giving them my standard spiel (“can’t guarantee I’ll post anything about it, let alone something favorable, you sure you want to send me this stuff?”), they sent me four kits—Classic Shoyu, Premium Spicy Miso, White Truffle Mushroom, and Ginger Garlic Shio.
Seems like their offerings change over time (they sent me these in March), so I think it’s more useful to provide a holistic review, rather than diving into specific bowls. The bottom line is these were surprisingly good! The flavor profiles of the broths were impressive, better than many brick-and-mortar ramen shops in New York City. The noodles were all pretty good—I’d guess they’re using Sun Noodles, except they didn’t have that characteristic too-high riboflavin content (which makes you pee funny for 24 hours). Maybe Yamachan is their supplier? Regardless: good enough. The chashu slices were also better than a lot of ramen restaurants out there. Texture was on the tougher side, but the flavor was good.
I was most impressed by their vegan ramen. Both the mushroom and the ginger garlic shio were vegan, but full-flavored and distinctly “ramen,”—I don’t know if that makes sense, but in my own attempts at making vegan soup ramen, I ran into this issue where some soups would taste good, but they didn’t scan as ramen. (The one vegan ramen that made it into the book was the exception.) Both of these passed that bar easily, and they had some nice garnishes and toppings that were also surprisingly delicious, like the seasoned burdock root and the generous portion of boiled edamame.
The one drawback that’s worth mentioning: The mushroom topping, which was featured in both vegan bowls. Basically, a bunch of cooked-down mushrooms, cut sort of weirdly, with an odd, almost canned-mushroom quality to them. It wasn’t bad, per se, but executed at a level far below the average of every other element of the bowls.
I’d recommend trying these out if you don’t mind the price (each 2-serving kit is about 33 bucks). If you don’t live in a major ramen hub, I’d bet these bowls are better than most offerings in your area. (I’d happily eat these over all but a handful of restaurants in NYC.) They are very salty, which is par for the course for restaurant ramen, so be warned (although this depends on how you prepare it; I prepared it using the smallest recommended amount of water.) The broths are quite thin, since the base is water
One note: Since I have gallons of ramen stock of all kinds in my fridge and freezer at any given time, I made each kit using stock for the broth, instead of water, and they are markedly superior when prepared with real stock. They taste less salty with real stock, too, but still quite delicious.
Oh, and the menma in the ramen kits? It’s good!