You Need To Try This is a running archive of all the awesome drinks and delicious dishes we’ve come across over the course of our professional and private lives.

Oddly, we have Covid-19 to thank for Menya Oyako. Launched this past October by Johnny Guang, formerly a cook at chef Andrea Carlson’s Burdock & Co., the take-home ramen venture was entirely pandemic-inspired.

Every Thursday, orders for the noodle soup kits are accepted via Instagram DM beginning at 5pm sharp and on a first-come-first-serve basis until they are sold out. Pick-ups are the following Wednesday, from 4:30pm to 9pm, at Guang’s home in Renfrew Heights.

Currently, Menya Oyako’s offerings include three flavours that rotate weekly: shoyu tori chin-tan soup (light chicken soup with a soy sauce base), tan-tan noodle (creamy pork and chicken broth with a spicy peanut flavour base) and shio tori-paitan (creamy chicken soup with a salt based flavouring).

Aside from handmade fresh ramen noodles and broth, Menya Oyako’s twist on the latter traditional recipe ($15 per kit) includes three thick slices of juicy, lemony and herbal tasting chicken ballotine, a lightly marinated soft egg, plus toppings of fresh sliced scallion, zippy radish microgreens and some furikake. The soup assembly takes less than ten minutes in your home kitchen, and in my opinion tastes at least as good as anything coming out of a Vancouver restaurant kitchen.

In addition to his kits, Menya Oyaka also makes udon noodles, which are available in limited quantities as an add-on to your ramen kit order (an easy upsell at $4 for a two-portion package), or from his mentor’s other retail business, Harvest Community Foods in Strathcona ($6 each).

Cool and rainy days call for ramen, and odds are we’ve still got plenty of those ahead. So do yourself a favour by setting a reminder for 5pm this Thursday afternoon, and get your order in for the next ramen kit drop here.