Orenchi

Santa Clara, CA

It's taken us a while to make it over to Orenchi Ramen, even though its only 10 minutes away from my parents house. And whenever we're with BroCo, we know he really likes the mini dombori accompaniment at Santouka so we usually go there. But on this Saturday afternoon, we decided to branch out and try Orenchi's ramen, who in their own right have a large loyal base of customers who claim this is the best ramen in the bay. We were surprised to have a long list of patrons ahead of us when we arrived, but the wait ended up being only about twenty minutes. We were all hungry so we started off with a pair of appetizers, fried calamari legs and karaage fried chicken.

Fried calamari legs

The fried calamari legs were good, a bit chewy and a pretty sparse (4 pieces) for $6. 

Karaage fried chicken

The karaage fried chicken was superb, maybe some of the best fried chicken I've ever had in my life. The batter was crisp, crunchy while the interior was extremely moist. It was the best dish of the meal and the one thing Orenchi has that a leg up on its local ramen competition.

Orenchi Tonkotsu Ramen, soft boiled seasoned egg, pork, green onion,
bamboo shoots, mushrooms,sesame, nori seaweed

I started with the Tonkotsu Ramen, which was the closest ramen they have to a classic ramen, with a deep pork brothy flavor. I liked it, most of all the perfect runny soft boil egg. 

Shoyu (soy sauce base) Ramen, pork, bamboo shoots, wakame seaweed,
Tokyo leak, fish cake, spinach, and nori seaweed

The Shoyu Ramen, soy sauce base, was the most boring of the bunch. It didn't taste like a ramen, but a basic Chinese noodle soup.

Shio (Salt) Ramen, pork, bamboo shoots, wakame seaweed, Tokyo leak, nori seaweed,

tororo seaweed, yuzu Japanese citrus

The Shio Ramen, like the Shoyu was boring. The most interesting part of their version was the slimy seaweed which added an interesting texture to the soup. Overall, the Tonkotsu ramen was the only one worth the trip and it didn't meet up to par with other ramen joints in the area. We're glad we crossed this one off the list, but probably won't be back unless we want some awesome karaage.

Rating 5.5/10
April 9, 2011