Our other stop for vegan ramen in Manchester was Maki & Ramen, which is a chain with several branches around the country. The Manchester branch is quite central, and had enough vegan options (several ramens, along with katsu and noodle dishes) to lure us in.

We started with the vegan bao, which has a surprisingly vague description on the menu – it doesn’t tell you what the bao contains, merely that it’s vegan. We were pleasantly surprised then to learn that it was filled with a crispy mock chicken patty. You can see in the picture how well fried it was, it had a fantastic texture. It tasted and looked good too – much more visually appealing than the bao at Shoryu Ramen. My only complaint is that the patty was actually far too big for the bun, making it a messy dish to eat.

Dr HH and I both ordered the black garlic tonkotsu ramen, which I’ve never seen on a menu in Prague. It didn’t quite live up to the name for me – I was expecting a proper smack of garlic, but it didn’t taste strongly garlicky at all. I was also expecting the broth to be a bit thicker, based on my (admittedly limited) understanding of tonkotsu, so I was a little disappointed on that front, but I can accept that I simply don’t know what a tonkotsu should be like. Nevertheless, it was a good savoury broth that we both enjoyed, even if we weren’t fully dazzled. The noodles were good. Alas, there’s bok choy, but it was fine. It came topped with vegan bacon, but we both ordered extra for ours, so these pictures do not represent the normal ramen. The bacon did not have what I remember as a very bacony texture, but it was meaty and flavoursome, and I absolutely loved it. I’d definitely order extra again in the future, because it really was the highlight of the dish.

I find the ramen spots in Prague have a lot of what I consider to be filler for the toppings, particularly loads of sweetcorn, so I enjoyed that both of the spots we tried in Manchester didn’t waste our time with the filler. The toppings were good, and the broths were generally more exciting than what we get in Prague. Even if you’re used to getting good ramen, I’d recommend Maki & Ramen!