ramen rating: mentatsu
Mentatsu ramen house opened recently in Costa Mesa, near the Mitsuwa plaza. It’s a tiny place with a nice atmosphere. Everyone from the chef to the wait staff greet you when you come in. Well then, right on to the food. I ordered fried rice, shoyu ramen, and gyoza. The fried rice was nicely done and the gyoza was good and garlicky. The ramen had decent chewy noodles, but were a bit on the bland side. The soup was quite good, rich in flavor. The fried rice and gyoza get a 7. The ramen gets a 7. I’ll definitely be back to try their other selections.
Ramen House Mentatsu
688 Baker St #7
Costa Mesa, CA 92626
714-979-2755
February 11th, 2006 at 7:13 pm
I just found a much better written review of Mentatsu at Professor Salt’s blog.
May 31st, 2006 at 12:31 am
i live across the street from there, and i just had my first visit a few days ago.
April 1st, 2008 at 8:07 am
I just went to Mentatsu yesterday after reading a positive review online (can’t remember the site), and it turned out to be a really bad experience. I ordered the chashumen, and my husband had the miso ramen. Neither were decent. The soup was very bland. The noodles were too soft. The bean sprouts were definitely not fresh. The so-called chashu seemed like overboiled slices of lean pork. It was so bad that we could not finish our bowls. Moreover, they forgot about our gyoza order, so we didn’t get to try that. Having just gotten back from Japan last week, the experience was very disappointing. If you’re craving ramen in the O.C., I highly recommend Kohryu and Shin-sen-gumi–both are 10x better than Mentatsu (in both food and service).