Grading Ramen

So, to business. After heading to a few locations around Melbourne, we decided to create a formal, objective grading system, so that we could have a more concrete comparison of all of the ramen that we would be eating. The grading system has seven categories. They are:

• Atmosphere - This involves the general "vibe" of the restaurant, as well as service, cleanliness, that sort of thing. The restaurant doesn't have to necessarily be clean and sophisticated, it can be small and grubby, but if it "feels" nice, then it has atmosphere. The atmosphere should be judged after leaving the restaurant, as it is only then that the part of the ramen experience that involves the restaurant is truly over.
  
• Presentation - What the ramen looks like. Does it look like some higher being has turned into a bowl of noodly goodness, or does it look like someone has watered down some sludge they found in a gutter, and chucked some noodles in it. The Presentation should be judged before eating the ramen, as after you dig in, it could get messy!
• Toppings - What toppings are on the ramen? Are there enough of them? Is there too much? Do they taste good, and are they substantial enough. Also, are they fitting to the ramen? Putting some teriyaki chicken in a bowl of tonkatsu ramen is just madness. This should be graded After the entire bowl of ramen has been mercilessly devoured.
• Noodles - Noodles should be plentiful, hot and have a nice texture. They shouldn't be too soft, or too hard. Something like Al Denté pasta is ideal. This should be graded after all of the noodles have disappeared mysteriously.
• Soup - This is basically the flavour of the soup. Does it taste good, and does it taste right? A soup might taste good, but if it tastes like nothing but shouyu, and it's supposed to be miso, then that won't do. This should be graded either at some point during the drinking of the soup, or after it is all gone.
• Overall Quality - Putting it simply, how was the ramen overall? There might have been a few discrepancies here and there, but looking back on it, you might decide that it was pretty good after all. This is pretty much putting a numerical value on how much you would say you enjoyed the ramen. This should be graded after the ramen has been eaten, and you are basking in the afterglow.
• Value - This isn't how much it cost, but what you got for your money. The ramen might have cost $50, but if it was the best ramen ever, you mightn't look too unfavourably upon its price. The ideal situation is perfect ramen for a cheap price, and the flipside of that is expensive, poor ramen.

Each of these seven categories is given a score out of 10, adding up to a total of 70. This is the score given to that Ramen restaurant, and is something I'm going to call the RWQ (Ramen Win Quotient).

So there you have it. I'll be putting all of the ramen restaurants into here, writing a short article about each one. I'll see about making a table of all of the ramen restaurants we go to, and their respective scores. If anyone happens to visit a ramen restaurant that they feel needs to be here, then grade it, send me your article, and I'll put it up here. Who knows, this could end up being a database for all Australian ramen restaurants!

So, that's it for now...

Ja ne~