Kamo Soba Keisuke Review: Duck Ramen By Chef Keisuke At Holland Village

Perhaps it’s as my first good experience with ramen was at his Bugis outlet. Prior to that, I was the ultimate ramen hater, liking the comforting Japanese noodle dish to Maggie mee.

Well, Chef Keisuke proved me wrong and since then I’ve been a loyal follower of his endless concepts, from Hamburg Steak Keisuke to his all-new, duck ramen restaurant in Holland Village, Kamo Soba Keisuke . Food at Kamo Soba Keisuke Having tried Chef Keisuke’s lobster ramen, truffle ramen, and tonkotsu ramen, my expectations for his duck ramen were high. Plus, since this is Keisuke’s second duck ramen restaurant – the first being located in Ginza, Tokyo – I was pretty confident it would do well.

We were first served the Special Hybrid Duck Broth Ramen ($19.90++ each) , in both Clear and Rich . An up-sized of the regular version, the bowl came filled with bamboo shoots, a marinated soft-centred egg, two slices of fatty duck and two yuzu duck meatballs.

Its taste straddled between the rich pork-bone broth I was so used to and the more delicate chicken ramen broth. The accompanying thin, ribbon-like noodles were a delight to slurp up too, and if I had one whole bowl to myself, I would have easily finished it in under 10 minutes.

The broth is thickened by adding more duck bones to the mix and simmering it over high heat for eight hours. When polled, it turned out that the majority of my younger companions preferred the rich broth, while those with a more mature palate preferred the clear soup. Grilled first to give the skin a nice char, Keisuke then marinates the Irish hybrid duck in a house-made shoyu-based sauce before steaming it at precisely 65-degrees Celsius.

If you prefer dry noodles, order the Hybrid Duck Maze Soba ($14.90++) . Each of the condiments played a part in cutting the richness of the noodles, by either imparting a little bit of heat or a pleasant tartness to the otherwise boring dish.

I asked, “Did you add yuzu into the dish too?” To which I was met with a humble no – it was grated wasabi. Ambience at Kamo Soba Keisuke A majority of Keisuke’s outlets are found in shophouses. The teak ceiling and panelled walls gave it a traditional vibe, while the touches of blue and red, both of which symbolises luck in Japan, helped brighten up and contemporised the space.

Before settling your belly with a bowl of Keisuke’s scrumptious ramen, keisuke is currently in the process of building a Japanese rooftop garden bar upstairs, so you can knock back a few glasses of sake . The only qualm I have is the pricing, especially for the quantity you get – we only had two slices of duck and two pieces of meatballs for the Special at $19.90++. I can’t imagine feeling satisfied if I ordered the regular bowl at $14.90++.

But I guess this is the quotation you have to pay if you want quality food that took painstaking hours to prepare.