Nerdy Noodles

July 30, 2022

If you are looking for a unique ramen experience with a broth that you don’t come by too often, then Ushi Taro Ramen might just be the ramen for you. Ushi Taro Ramen is located in San Francisco near Golden Gate Park off 9th Ave. What makes them so unique is their choice of protein and broth. This little and mighty ramen shop uses gyukotsu(beef bone)(牛骨) broth rather than tonkotsu(pork bone)(豚骨) broth.

The menu at Ushi Taro is limited but their selection is awesome. They have an original, spicy, original shio, ox tail tomato, and vegan ramen. Ushi Taro also has a soupless ramen option that is not listed in the menu available in their restaurant. Their menu also includes a myriad of appetizers that are also really tasty.

During our visit, we decided to sample a couple of their appetizers and three of their ramen options. For our appetizers, we had two of the items on Ushi Taro’s menu, Beef Karaage, and Crispy Mushroom. These appetizers were made very well and tasted delicious. They were still very crispy yet tender and not dried out or overcooked. We especially enjoyed the crispy mushrooms.

For the three ramen we had from Ushi Taro, we had the Traditional Paitan, the Spicy, and the soupless Ox Tail Ramen. Ushi Taro provides a side option of having bone marrow with your ramen so we couldn’t pass that up.

The Traditional Paitan is made with a gyukotsu broth cooked with kelp, bonito, and mushrooms. The toppings it comes with are beef fillet, oyster mushrooms, onsen tamago, scallions, and truffle. Our order also came with the added bone marrow and black garlic oil. The broth was rich with a delightful umami flavor to it. Each of the beef fillet pieces was cooked to a perfect medium rare.

The Spicy is made similarly to the Traditional Paitan, it contains the same gyukotsu broth as the Traditional Paitan, along with the same toppings, roast beef fillet, oyster mushrooms, the onsen tamago, scallions, and truffle. However, the additional ingredient that makes it spicy is their house red chili that is added to the broth. We also added bone marrow and black garlic oil to this ramen as well. This ramen tasted just as good as the Traditional Paitan but was slightly more enjoyable because of the nice heat added to the broth by Ushi Taro’s house red chili. Personally, the Spicy is my favorite from their entire menu. The bone marrow was extremely rich and delicious.

The noodles were at a perfect kata-men(firm) firmness for these thick and wavy noodles.

The final dish we had from Ushi Taro was the Ox Tail Soupless Ramen which is not on their regular menu. This soupless ramen came with ox tail braised in their tomato base topped with green and red lettuce, oyster mushroom, onsen tamago, and a nice clear and light beef broth on the side. This soupless ramen was definitely on the lighter side and could have probably used a little more umami because it was a little lacking in the flavor department.

Ushi Taro is a great place to go have some very unique ramen if you are in the bay area. Even in Japan gyukotsu broth ramen is not commonly found. They have a great atmosphere, very accommodating staff, superb service, and excellent food. We are giving it a possible 14 out of 15 points rated by noodles, broth, and service.

Stay tuned for our next adventure!