Five Loaves

Yamato East Asia Cuisine is one of the newer ramen places in Richmond. They’re located in the Richmond Public Market, and they’ve only been open for a few weeks (maybe months?). The store is accessible from within RPM as well as from Buswell Street.

After recently going to G-Men, my Richmond ramen expectations were raised a little bit. When we got to Yamato, I definitely found something that I didn’t expect: the prices!

Each ramen was $5.99! I can’t remember the last time I ate at a restaurant where the prices of the main dish started with a 5 (unless it was $50). The menu is about average size for a ramen place with plenty of choices.

Yamato’s interior was clearly not their first priority. Since they are new, things still look a little bare and unfinished. There was also a minor mix up when they were seating us, they moved us around and we sat at a round table at the back. The staff at Yamato also barely spoke English, which made it hard to order, or even ask what was in each ramen. They had a heavy Mandarin accent, so, if you speak mandarin, you’re good to go.

After ordering our dishes, a small appetizer of cold tofu and peanuts came. We didn’t order it, so I think they were just being nice to us.. possibly because of the seating mix up, possibly cause of our SLRs, or possibly because of our dashing good looks.

I’m not a huge fan of cold tofu or peanuts, so this dish obviously wasn’t for me. Danny on the other hand enjoyed it very much. The flavor of the tofu and celery was good, and it was slightly spicy. The peanuts were soft, but it was slightly too salty.

For our main dishes, Phil got the house special: Yamato Ramen. He was actually the one who told us about this place since it’s very convenient for him. The Yamato Ramen had pork, tofu and a murky soup base. He was quite pleased with it and said that for the price and location, he would definitely be coming back.

Danny went with the Seafood Udon that consists of shrimps, mussel, squid balls, stewed egg, corn, lettuce and udon.  The stewed egg was prepared nicely but the udon tasted like its straight from the udon packets.  Danny said he would not order the Seafood Udon again, but would try the ramen on the next visit.  We also all noticed that the soup bases were a little different than most ramen places. The soup base here has a sort of Chinese soup flavor to it. This isn’t completely a bad thing, but it is a little.. different.

I decided to go with the relatively safe choice of Roast Pork (cha shu) Ramen. It had a clear soup base which, as mentioned, tasted a little more like Chinese soup, and less like ramen soup. The roast pork was good, they were sliced fairly thick, and were not too fatty. The noodles were also pretty good: not too soft, and not too chewy.

Overall, Yamato is not bad. The lack of English makes it hard to communicate, and their ramen probably isn’t true ramen. However, if you’re not a ramen connoisseur, you’re around RPM, and you can’t say no to $5.99, then I would certainly give them a try!

Five Loaves Rating:
Value: 7/10
Quality: 6/10
Overall: 6.5/10

Verdict: Great prices with ok quality. Perfect if you’re in the area, looking for a cheap, quick snack.