I don’t get in to town much these days and to be honest a visit to a chain when I do is not usually top of my to do list.

I had, however, heard mostly good things about Tonkotsu (a chain that originated, very much as a labour of love, in London) and thus when J asked if I was free for an early dinner on a Thursday (people she was originally going with having bailed and as such I was very much the back up) I thought why not (especially as she was driving and thus prepared to pick me up and drop me back home).

Chains as against independents tend to get (often with some justification) a bad rap, but there are some that have merit and early feedback I had heard as to Tonkotsu’s offering suggested this was one of the better ones. How it would hold up against the likes of Matsudai and Don Don Yatai was a question that was at the forefront of my thinking when I accepted J’s invite.

The “About” blurb on the website suggests an attention to detail that boded well, with them for instance making the noodles in house.

It is certainly a big old space,

and I was slightly surprised at J’s difficult in booking a table (17.30 or post 20.00 were the only available options) when the place had only a few tables occupied at the time of our arrival and still so when we left. Perhaps they hold the majority for walk ins?

The food menu looks bigger than it is in reality, with a lot of verbiage (and trust me, I should know),

and includes what looks to be a pretty competitively priced lunch offer

There were also some summer specials

none of which really appealed.

After a short time considering the menu options, we started off with a trio of snacks/side dishes

Their (highly rated) chicken kara- age (£8.95)

certainly lived up to the hype. A good crisp, nicely craggy, coating (with a pleasing touch of spice) encased juicy thigh meat that benefited from a ginger and garlic marinade. Very moreish with a squeeze of lemon and a dab of mayo.

Pork, ginger and garlic gyozo (£7.25) also hit the mark, with the skins not too thick and a pleasing crispness on one side.

The filling was well flavoured with the garlic and ginger making their present felt without overpowering the pork.

The final dish of our initial trio was some cucumber and mustard seed pickles (£3.95).

I liked the seasoning, which I assume was togarashi, but found the pickling very light to the point of the cucumber just being wet and any vinegar seemingly at homeopathic levels of concentration.

I did notice that on the menu reference is made to the ability to order smaller portion sizes if eating solo.

Whilst the kara – age was a decent portion, the cucumber (full size) was already quite little. Not sure how much you could downsize it before it becomes pretty pointless.

On to the mains event, with the name of the place, a tonkotsu would be the logical choice. As the weather (finally) had warmed up somewhat (we are all going to die, its 26°c), I decided to go with a lighter ramen dish in the form of the Tokyo (£15.50).

The plusses were there was a good amount of braised pork, with nicely gelatinous skin and fat kept on it and there was a properly jammy soy egg (the soy flavour could have penetrated the white a bit more). I also enjoyed the “in house made” noodles, which retained a pleasing bit of bite.

On the negative side, I know the broth in a Tokyo ramen is suppose to be light, but I found it quite bland. I had to pep it up with chilli oil, soy sauce and rice wine vinegar, which lifted it from the otherwise quite mundane (at least to my jaded palate).

It was just a bit boring, if I am honest. A bad choice on my behalf, perhaps, as I like a bit more full throttle on the favour front ramen wise?

J went for the chilli chicken ramen (£15.95),

Whilst this had more flavour than my Tokyo, J felt it lacked the advertised chilli hit and thus she had to add quite a lot of their in-house chilli oil to get it to what she considered to be an appropriate spice level.

In summary both ramen dishes seemed to be a bit underpowered flavour wise.

On the drinks front, J was driving and I had had a skin full the night before (at the Mystere Wine Club dinner, with a surfeit of wines drunk) and thus we both went for soft drinks.

I had the yuzu lemonade and J had the “fiery” ginger and sansho soda (both £3.50)

Both were nice enough (mine was better than J’s, with it not particularly fiery despite both the ginger and the sansho pepper in the mix), but were slightly marred by the large amount of ice in both. In reality, this made what looked like a quite long drink somewhat shorter.

J also ordered the unlimited filtered fizzy water (£1.50).

I was quite skeptical about this (thinking why not just order tap water),  but if you want fizzy the carbonation wasn’t too aggressive and was better than most bottled fizzy water I have had.

If I had been drinking booze, I think I would have gone for a beer as the wine list is a little uninspiring to say the least (although I do like that they do all the wines on the list by the glass and in carafe format).

Looking at the wine prices

the sauvignon blanc retails at around the £10 mark and the pinot noir retails at around the £14 mark. With the marked retail price difference (40%), it is odd that they are on the list at the same price. Regardless mark ups seem OK by UK standards.

Beer wise, the Mikan shimoda pale ale (a collaboration between Tonkotsu and Thornbridge) looks interesting and Siren beers tend (in my limited experience) to be pretty good.

The verdict

I really enjoyed the kara – age and the gyozo, but was less enamoured with the cucumber side and the ramens.

Both ramens felt a bit underpowered flavour wise (and the cucumber pickles needed to be well more pickled).

As a result, I thought it was OK rather than being wowed.  The lunch time deal may well entice me in again (if happen to be in town and in need of a quick lunch), but I am not sure I would go again for dinner.

It is certainly one of the better chains (they have 19 outlets, mainly in London), but I think I would tend to favour the flavours at the likes of Matsudai and Don Don Yatai if I was looking for food of this ilk in Cardiff.

Tonkotsu do have the jump on those places location wise, so no doubt it will do well regardless.

The details

Address:  7 High Street, Cardiff, CF10 1AW

Website: https://tonkotsu.co.uk/locations/cardiff/

Opening hours: