Reren Lamen & Bar - Ramen restaurant in Washington - 817 7th St NW, USA

Jan 2024: this Chinese restaurant is located at Gallery place in Washington DC. It’s small and cozy but can seat plenty more upstairs. I had the shrimp. It tasted nice, fresh juicy shrimp, but the sauce was way too salty, rate it 7/10. Same for the edamame, rate it 4/10. The Not your mama’s eggplant dish was 8/10. A good veggie option. The staff were introverted and not that friendly.

We got the lamen and I think it was pretty alright. Both the vegetarian and chicken ones seemed a bit on the blander side and even the chili oil didn’t have much of a flavor. I will say the service was really quick and there were other things that looked really good on the menu that I would love to come back and try, so I will be back!

I ate here with colleagues while in DC for the union. They had a table for six available almost right away on a Friday evening at about 6 pm. I tried the peppery chicken and the smashed cucumber. These would be good to order for the table and share, but my colleagues don't really have that understanding with dining out at Asian restaurants. The peppery chicken had a good balance of Szechuan peppers and other flavors, it's a dish I would order again. The cucumbers were good, too, nice balanced vinegar flavor. I enjoyed my experience here and would come back to try more of the menu.

So happy I stopped here for lunch. All the dishes we had were good. I started with grandma’s pancakes. Then my husband and I shared the Dan Dan noodles. We ended with spicy wontons. No wait to be seated on a Friday for lunch.

Nice noodle place close to the convention center. We ordered the original flavor broth and the beef one, along with Nanjing chicken and soup dumplings (小笼包）. Soup dumplings got hella meat but not much juice. Noodles have a good texture. Chicken was also aight. Overall pretty alright Chinese joint for DC.

We had a great lunch. Everyone loved the ramen, rice, edamame, noodles and more. Water was ready right away and more food was brought quickly. Wish there were kids meal options.

The soup dumplings are great, and I wish we had just ordered a ton of these instead of our entrees. The general tso and lo mein had little to no flavor, a bit over salted, and extremely expensive for generic takeaway dishes. The service also seemed rushed so they could accommodate more people, we received our check before we had a chance to get halfway through our meal. Maybe the ramen was the way to go because the entrees aren’t worth the price if you’re looking for something to savor over!

Food was great, and would sure please anyone. I did find that Dumplings were a little over steamed, but still tasty. I wished the broth was a bit richer with the Lamen, and the Dan Dan Noodles could have been a lot spicier. However, it is a great little place!