The first bowl I ever loved was tonkotsu.
It was raining. I was young and broke and cold, and someone set down a bowl of pork broth so thick it clung to the sides. I drank it like it was owed to me.
I still love it. That's the honest place I'm starting from.
But somewhere along the way, I noticed something. Every menu I opened, tonkotsu sat near the top, printed a little bigger than the rest. It became the safe order. The one you point to when you don't want to think.
That's when it hit me.
Tonkotsu had become the pumpkin spice latte of ramen. Comforting. Reliable. Loved by nearly everyone, and quietly assumed by nearly everyone too.
There's a reason we keep reaching for it. That creamy, milky richness. The way the fat coats your lips and stays. The aroma that finds you before the bowl even lands, warm and deep and a little indulgent. It asks nothing of you. It just holds you.
And there's nothing wrong with wanting to be held.
But I've started to wonder if familiarity has dulled my attention. When a dish becomes shorthand for "good ramen," we stop tasting it and start expecting it. We order it the way we order the pumpkin spice latte in October, out of habit, out of season, out of some quiet agreement that this is simply what we do now.
I don't say this to scold anyone. I've been that person, spoon halfway to my mouth, not really tasting, just comforted.
I say it because I think the best food deserves to be noticed, not assumed. Even tonkotsu. Especially tonkotsu.
So the next time that rich, familiar bowl arrives, maybe pause before the first sip. Ask if you still love it, or if you just expect it. And if you find you love it anyway, good. That's the whole point.
I just don't want us to sleepwalk through the thing we say we love most..
