You may be going insane, but you still need to eat.

An excellent place for such business is Tori Ramen.

Korea and it’s many magnificent offerings from skincare to music to food have certainly been having a moment (or three) here in the states. I have found myself quite fond of much of the food. I was told for so many years(mostly by not chefs, I should add) it couldn’t be made vegan and now multiple places in the TC area have not only vegan food, they have some of my favorite food I have ever had the joy to consume.

Now ramen when you grow up beneath the poverty level as I did, is a pretty important food group for your undernourished diet. I remember being able to get cases of it for $3 and that’s what we had to eat for a week. If we were lucky, there was something fresh added to it in a vegetable form and occasionally inexpensive ground beef.

But look, we didn’t die. We owe ramen our lives, it would seem.

A lot of ramen out there now is created with a seemingly unending bevy of delights and the ramen at Tori is no exception.

One of my favorite dishes is the Korea Ramen which includes shredded tofu (when ordered vegan), black garlic, kimchi, chili oil.

I had a weird time because for a while I thought I didn’t like kimchi. I have no recollection why I thought this way, but I did. Perhaps I had a batch that didn’t agree with me at some point. Turns out- I love it. And in many different dishes. Also, I recently read it might remove microplastics from your body. What’s not to love?

Tori has a full bar (I love the strawberry cocktail) and the flavorful, tasty delight that is spicy cucumbers as a starter. I’ve grown to like spicy cucumbers so much we make them at home sometimes.

And on the ever important front of whimsy, the main part of the restaurant is a train car with a bar attached and garage doors that open up to the street and trees so 10/10.