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It's $20.50 here in Brooklyn at a small neighborhood place (including tax and tip)! Ridiculous. I bought a premium instant ramen on Amazon, add my own meat/egg

It's $20.50 here in Brooklyn at a small neighborhood place (including tax and tip)! Ridiculous. I bought a premium instant ramen on Amazon, add my own meat/egg and it's as good or better.

xor1 9y ago
Uhh what kind of places are you going to? And what kind of ramen did you buy? I consider Shinsengumi to be my minimum acceptable standard for restaurant ramen here in SoCal (I think there's plenty of better places here, but it's still good), and I don't even know how you could prepare instant ramen that was comparable even if you had comparable noodles, since the broth takes hours to prepare.
- mathperson 9y ago
  I'm not a ramen expect but I love shin seen gumi
- coldtea 9y ago
  >and I don't even know how you could prepare instant ramen that was comparable even if you had comparable noodles, since the broth takes hours to prepare. Well, some people find Olive Garden as good as a high end restaurant in Rome, so for them it's "comparable".
- cylinder 9y ago
  I'm not a ramen connoisseur but to have this kind of ramen at home is a treat. I sometimes add mushrooms, garlic, chilis to broth. Nongshim Shin Black Noodle Soup, Spicy, 4.58 (Pack of 10) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B017IRZLKQ/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apap_nz6qIikbnKhMn https://www.amazon.com/dp/B017IRZLKQ/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apap_nz6... Theoretically there's no reason why a quality broth can't be reduced to powder form and used with instant ramen.
  - CydeWeys 9y ago
    That's my favorite store-bought brand too, but it still pales in comparison to fresh ramen at a good shop. > Theoretically there's no reason why a quality broth can't be reduced to powder form and used with instant ramen. I mean .. there really are. There are all sorts of aromatics and fats that can't be properly powderized. Note that, e.g., coffee is way better in fresh form than powder form, as are a huge multitude of foods.
    - panzer_wyrm 9y ago
      Press it in osmosis membrane and ship it in a can.
      - CydeWeys 9y ago
        Food doesn't work like that. There are plenty of foods that taste substantially different after sitting for just 15 minutes, let alone packaged and let sit at room temperature for months. Ramen is a very aromatic broth; it will not taste the same after months.
  - xor1 9y ago
    >Theoretically there's no reason why a quality broth can't be reduced to powder form and used with instant ramen. I think the biggest issue is that dried animal fats will significantly reduce the shelf life. I've tried a bunch of Nongshim stuff (including that one). I think it's the best instant ramen I've tried (although I've heard there's better stuff available in Asia), but it doesn't compare to the real stuff, even if you add things to it.
lr4444lr 9y ago
You're paying that largely to cover the establishment's rent, insurance and NYC regulations compliance of course, not the ingredients.
wahnfrieden 9y ago
Ramen in NYC is mostly an exoticized item served at comparatively fancier places than the typically utilitarian presentation you'll find all over Japan. It's no wonder that you can find it at $20+ in Brooklyn.
- mc32 9y ago
  It's interesting to see how foods become either premium (ala Japanese in the US) or commoditized like Vietnamese or Thai in the US. On the other hand, In Japan Thai or Indian can be premium cuisines. On the other hand, most of it is presentation and perception. You can get a $5 burger as well as find a $20 burger --if you search hard enough you can find a $5 with the same quality as the $20 version --so it's not always exoticism that does the trick.
  - contingencies 9y ago
    Pricing strategies for restaurants are not driven by whole-market perceptions but many combining factors such as local competition, available space, labor and rental costs, hours of available custom, etc. To put it another way, you can do a high end anything restaurant, but takeaway makes far more sense in a high traffic location with massive rush hours, high rents and little available space, no foot traffic after 5PM and no access after 8PM.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > It's interesting to see how foods become either premium (ala Japanese in the US) or commoditized like Vietnamese or Thai in the US. There's commoditized Japanese in the US, and there is probably premium Thai and Vietnamese.
    - mc32 9y ago
      There of course are exceptions to all sorts of things, but generally speaking these things hold. There are also high-end restaurants which serve mexican cuisine, but by and large, most establishments selling Mexican food sell what poor Mexicans understand as fast food in Mexico --but one can also find these to be expensive in far away places like Japan or China where reproductions using more local flavors can go for relatively high prices.
brut 9y ago
But you can get a $2.50 burger at a fast food joint. This is what you should compare the ramen to :)
- drewblaisdell 9y ago
  That isn't a fair comparison, as there is a massive difference in the quality of hole-in-the-wall ramen in Tokyo and a $2 fast food chain hamburger in the US.
  - ghaff 9y ago
    I guess the issue is that fast food in the US is pretty protein-centric, which is fairly expensive for good quality. I'd probably take the hole-in-the-wall ramen personally but I can't think of any typical US "fast food" that lends itself well to inexpensive quality. Good ramen isn't that cheap or easy to prepare but the time and ingredients required to make the broth can be spread over a lot of servings.
baby 9y ago
oO. Totto in Manhattan is one of the most famous Ramen and it's 12$ for a ramen. I don't know how much you tip but it's pretty far from 20$
- ghaff 9y ago
  I think you're quibbling. Add ~9% tax and ~18% tip and you're approaching $16 which isn't all that far from $20. Santouka Ramen is a similar price although there are various add-ons that get you up to $20 pretty quickly.

It's $20.50 here in Brooklyn at a small neighborhood place (including tax and tip)! Ridiculous. I bought a premium instant ramen on Amazon, add my own meat/egg and it's as good or better.

xor1 9y ago

Uhh what kind of places are you going to? And what kind of ramen did you buy? I consider Shinsengumi to be my minimum acceptable standard for restaurant ramen here in SoCal (I think there's plenty of better places here, but it's still good), and I don't even know how you could prepare instant ramen that was comparable even if you had comparable noodles, since the broth takes hours to prepare.

mathperson 9y ago
I'm not a ramen expect but I love shin seen gumi
coldtea 9y ago
>and I don't even know how you could prepare instant ramen that was comparable even if you had comparable noodles, since the broth takes hours to prepare. Well, some people find Olive Garden as good as a high end restaurant in Rome, so for them it's "comparable".
cylinder 9y ago
I'm not a ramen connoisseur but to have this kind of ramen at home is a treat. I sometimes add mushrooms, garlic, chilis to broth. Nongshim Shin Black Noodle Soup, Spicy, 4.58 (Pack of 10) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B017IRZLKQ/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apap_nz6qIikbnKhMn https://www.amazon.com/dp/B017IRZLKQ/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apap_nz6... Theoretically there's no reason why a quality broth can't be reduced to powder form and used with instant ramen.
- CydeWeys 9y ago
  That's my favorite store-bought brand too, but it still pales in comparison to fresh ramen at a good shop. > Theoretically there's no reason why a quality broth can't be reduced to powder form and used with instant ramen. I mean .. there really are. There are all sorts of aromatics and fats that can't be properly powderized. Note that, e.g., coffee is way better in fresh form than powder form, as are a huge multitude of foods.
  - panzer_wyrm 9y ago
    Press it in osmosis membrane and ship it in a can.
    - CydeWeys 9y ago
      Food doesn't work like that. There are plenty of foods that taste substantially different after sitting for just 15 minutes, let alone packaged and let sit at room temperature for months. Ramen is a very aromatic broth; it will not taste the same after months.
- xor1 9y ago
  >Theoretically there's no reason why a quality broth can't be reduced to powder form and used with instant ramen. I think the biggest issue is that dried animal fats will significantly reduce the shelf life. I've tried a bunch of Nongshim stuff (including that one). I think it's the best instant ramen I've tried (although I've heard there's better stuff available in Asia), but it doesn't compare to the real stuff, even if you add things to it.

lr4444lr 9y ago

You're paying that largely to cover the establishment's rent, insurance and NYC regulations compliance of course, not the ingredients.

wahnfrieden 9y ago

Ramen in NYC is mostly an exoticized item served at comparatively fancier places than the typically utilitarian presentation you'll find all over Japan. It's no wonder that you can find it at $20+ in Brooklyn.

mc32 9y ago
It's interesting to see how foods become either premium (ala Japanese in the US) or commoditized like Vietnamese or Thai in the US. On the other hand, In Japan Thai or Indian can be premium cuisines. On the other hand, most of it is presentation and perception. You can get a $5 burger as well as find a $20 burger --if you search hard enough you can find a $5 with the same quality as the $20 version --so it's not always exoticism that does the trick.
- contingencies 9y ago
  Pricing strategies for restaurants are not driven by whole-market perceptions but many combining factors such as local competition, available space, labor and rental costs, hours of available custom, etc. To put it another way, you can do a high end anything restaurant, but takeaway makes far more sense in a high traffic location with massive rush hours, high rents and little available space, no foot traffic after 5PM and no access after 8PM.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > It's interesting to see how foods become either premium (ala Japanese in the US) or commoditized like Vietnamese or Thai in the US. There's commoditized Japanese in the US, and there is probably premium Thai and Vietnamese.
  - mc32 9y ago
    There of course are exceptions to all sorts of things, but generally speaking these things hold. There are also high-end restaurants which serve mexican cuisine, but by and large, most establishments selling Mexican food sell what poor Mexicans understand as fast food in Mexico --but one can also find these to be expensive in far away places like Japan or China where reproductions using more local flavors can go for relatively high prices.

brut 9y ago

But you can get a $2.50 burger at a fast food joint. This is what you should compare the ramen to :)

drewblaisdell 9y ago
That isn't a fair comparison, as there is a massive difference in the quality of hole-in-the-wall ramen in Tokyo and a $2 fast food chain hamburger in the US.
- ghaff 9y ago
  I guess the issue is that fast food in the US is pretty protein-centric, which is fairly expensive for good quality. I'd probably take the hole-in-the-wall ramen personally but I can't think of any typical US "fast food" that lends itself well to inexpensive quality. Good ramen isn't that cheap or easy to prepare but the time and ingredients required to make the broth can be spread over a lot of servings.

baby 9y ago

oO. Totto in Manhattan is one of the most famous Ramen and it's 12$ for a ramen. I don't know how much you tip but it's pretty far from 20$

ghaff 9y ago
I think you're quibbling. Add ~9% tax and ~18% tip and you're approaching $16 which isn't all that far from $20. Santouka Ramen is a similar price although there are various add-ons that get you up to $20 pretty quickly.