The owners of Kyushu Ramen Bar, which has locations in Grandview and Lewis Center (and which I consider some of the Best Ramen in Columbus), recently renovated and revamped their concept on Bethel Road called Yun Nan Crossing Bridge Noodle!
The noodle bar consists of a single room, tucked into the corner of the Carriage Place Plaza between Halab Cafe and Asian International Market. The full space features maybe a dozen wooden booths; they seem to do a steady carryout business as well.
The two-page menu features a collection of appetizers, ramen, stir-fried noodle or rice bowls, plus drinks and desserts.
But the real feature are the crossing bridge noodle soups. These dishes originate from the Yunnan province of China, are in their basic form are soups that you mix together yourself. Keep scrolling down to see how it works!
Before we dug into our noodle bowls, we tried a few appetizers, like a simple but easy-to-love miso soup.
Props to the takoyaki, or fried octopus balls. They’re rich and fragrant.
We tasted a pair of steam buns as well, both excellent. These are the karaage buns. Karaage is fried chicken, in case you didn’t know.
And these are the pork belly buns. Both are nicely composed, with that ideal blend of sweet and salty, savory and crispy.
Not everyone at the table ordered the noodle soups. We can attest to the quality of the yaki udon bowl with chicken!
And now it’s time for the main event: the crossing bridge noodle soups. There are seven different types of soups on the menu, but the signature is the house special rice noodle soup.
As part of the gimmick, the house special dish arrives on a tiny bridge! (You can read about some of the supposed origins of crossing-the-bridge noodles here.)
The bowl of broth, noodles, and ingredients arrive separately. There’s an illustrated set of instructions on the wall and on your menu, and your server will also tell you how to assemble the soup.
The ingredients on the bridge include everything from two types of beef, sausage, shrimp, scallops, fish cakes, clam, a quail egg, tofu, vegetables, and more.
First up is your broth, which is delivered table-side sizzling hot in a bowl.
Our server suggested starting first with the beef, since that was raw and thinly sliced. That way it could cook while we added everything else in.
How you add the rest of the ingredients is up to you, depending on how thoroughly you want them cooked. We started with the proteins before moving on to vegetables.
Your final step is to pour in the bowl of noodles, give it all a stir, and then you’re good to go!
We loved each of our bowls. The broth is nicely seasoned without being too salty or overpowering, and the plentiful ingredients mean the bowls are very filling.
Yun Nan Crossing Bridge Noodle is currently open Sunday-Thursday, 11 a.m to 9:30 p.m. and Friday-Saturday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Yun Nan Crossing Bridge Noodle
2548 Bethel Rd.
Columbus, OH 43220
(614) 929-5552
Web: yunnannoodle.com
FB: Yun Nan Crossing Bridge Noodle
IG: @yunnannoodle
