Winterlicious at Momofuku Noodle Bar

Liz and I went out for dinner to celebrate our respective good news at Momofuku Noodle Bar (190 University Ave) last week. We met shortly before 7:00PM and were soon seated and surprised by the Salad King like set-up. It was definitely not a place for a quiet conversation but the atmosphere was lively and inviting. I thus had no complaints on that front.

We had a lot to catch up on and so we took our time before deciding on the following: the Salmon Ceviche to start, the Dan Dan Mein and the Winter Ramen, and the Compost Cookie to cap the night off.

Salmon Ceviche

The Salmon Ceviche arrived first. It came with spicy seaweed crisps and chunks of dressed salmon. I was initially unimpressed by the crisp but it quickly grew on me after I got to taste the seaweed and the spice in the dish. The salmon was good as well although not as impressive as the main below.

Winter Ramen

The mains arrived at the same time as our appetizers and were probably the highlight of our entire evening. I ordered the Winter Ramen and loved it. I liked all of the ingredients in the dish as well as its presentation. Moreover, it was a sizable portion too and stayed quite warm while I finished the Salmon Ceviche. I really enjoyed it and highly recommend it to future Momofuku diners.

Compost Cookie

The Compost Cookie dessert followed our mains and was, unfortunately, off-putting. It was packaged in a plastic wrapper and was nonchalantly tossed onto our table by our server as an afterthought. While it it tasted fine, the Compost Cookie just lacked the pizazz I would have expected from an apparently top notch establishment even if it was just for a Winterlicious run.

All things considered, Momofuku Noodle Bar fulfills its namesake of being a noodle place. I would certainly go back there for a quick bowl of ramen but would probably opt for appetizers and desserts elsewhere.