GREEN Tony Ly, owner of downtown Canton's much-loved Basil Asian Bistro and its popular Wooster branch, has been wanting to open a ramen restaurant for years.

"The opportunity just never showed itself," he said Tuesday. "I didn't want to wait until someone else did it."

Recently, Ly made the decision to convert his Basil restaurant in Green, which has suffered from a somewhat hidden location, into Ramen Katsu. The place has a fresh new menu while keeping Basil's sushi menu and sushi chef, Gio. Ramen Katsu is to Ly's knowledge the only ramen eatery between Cleveland and Columbus.

"This off-the-beaten-track location lends itself better to the whole ramen experience," Ly said. It is located at 4195 Massillon Road, just before the traffic roundabout, in a strip mall perpendicular to the street.

Ly and ramen have a long history together. "I've been eating ramen since I was a kid. When you're the kid of cooks and restaurateurs, they're never home, and I was in charge of feeding my sisters. I always knew how to boil water, and I was always wanting to make the ramen better. I was always adding fish balls, tofu, ethnic vegetables to it, always experimenting. To me, ramen's always been a comfort food."

Before my Ramen Katsu visit last Friday for lunch, ramen was a new experience for me — aside from those dirt-cheap paper containers of dry noodles and flavor powder that are major college-student sustenance.

At Ramen Katsu, the enormous soup bowls have multiple varieties of broth and a wide range of other toppings in addition to the curly, spaghetti-like ramen noodles. There are 10 different ramen bowls to choose from, along with a build-your-own-bowl option.

Fortunately, our server, Charlie, was super-knowledgeable and patient with our many menu questions, and an enthusiastic ramen fan. He explained how the pork belly at Ramen Katsu is twined into a log and oven-cooked for 18 hours. Cabbage is fermented in-house. Dried mushrooms are brought back to life in a long process.

The first bowl we tried, Scampi Doodle Doo ($12), starts with the shoyu broth, which is slow-cooked chicken broth seasoned with hondashi (smoked fish) and taré (a soy sauce-saké reduction). The Doodle Doo toppings are chicken katsu (delicious crispy-crusted sliced chicken), tempura shrimp, a soft-boiled egg sliced in half, sweet corn, nori (dried seaweed), enoki mushrooms and minced garlic. The textures and flavors were on point, although my friend found the soup a bit salty.

Our second bowl, Co-Crazy ($11), starts with the tonkotsu broth, which is pork stock simmered for 36 hours, then blended with coconut milk and topped with tender thin-sliced pork belly, sweet corn, soft-boiled egg and scallions. This was a subtler, sweeter soup.

Ramen bowls with their long noodles are challenging to eat, a process made easier by dexterity with chopsticks. I have none, so I used a large spoon and my fork, which resulted in lots of slurping and soup running down my chin. (This might not be the best place to take a first date.) But oh, it was pleasurable, and also a fun food adventure. My friend and I each consumed less than half of our ramen bowls, but sturdy paper soup containers made take-home a breeze; the soup actually improved in the refrigerator overnight.

Ramen Katsu also has vegetarian soup stock available, and rice noodles for people who are gluten intolerant.

We also ordered two non-soup items at Ramen Katsu. The generous mound of garlic edamame ($6) was an excellent starter, with prominent garlic and a nice spicy heat, an addictive and healthy finger food. Other appetizers include cold sesame tofu, tempura shrimp, pork gyoza (dumplings), and pig ear pad thai.

The steam buns ($6 for two) were akin to Asian sliders. Ours had more of the addictive chicken katsu, with pickled carrot, daikon (radish) and sriracha aioli adding flavor punch. Steam buns also are available with pork belly, pork katsu, unagi (eel) and fried sesame tofu, with varying sauces.

The cafe-sized Ramen Katsu has nice upholstered booths, a sushi bar with stools, and a number of visually engaging paintings by Thomas Morgan on the walls. The background music -- by Earth, Wind & Fire, War and a variety of Motown artists — made for a lively soundtrack. The restaurant serves beer, wine and cocktails.