Ramen55 Leiden — Restaurant in Leiden

I had a very bad experience in this restaurant. It is a horrible restaurant. The service including the waiter and the chef is very bad. My experience is as follows. I ordered the secret menu (unwritten menu). I asked the waiter how much for that. The waiter said it is ten euros. So I decided to take the secret menu. It turned out it was a very big dish and the waiter said “you are lucky”. I was thinking at that time it was a surprise for me. In order to show respect to the chef and the secret menu, I ate the whole dish although it was too much for me. However, after finishing the dish, I was charged with 24 euros. Immediately I got confused. At the beginning it was 10 euros, and now it became 24 euros. It turned out that the waiter made the mistake. But I don’t think I should take the responsibility for this mistake. So I refused to pay for the 24 euros. The waiter who made the mistake kept saying “I am so sorry, so sorry”. The other waiter kept saying “I am so sorry, but you have to pay for 24 euros”. And the chef, the so-called boss of this restaurant, said if I won’t pay for the 24 euros, the waiter who made the mistake will pay for the gap, i.e. 14 euros. He put me in a very bad situation, very very bad situation. It seems that If I won’t pay for the 24 euros, the waiter who made the mistake will be in a very bad situation, even get fired. He was so rude. We argued around 40 minutes, and finally they decided to charge me 19 euros with the so-called 5 euros discount. Because I really don’t want to waste much more time, so I paid for 19 euros. I said I won’t come to this restaurant again, and the other waiter said “ok” with a big smile. It is not only about the price, but also the attitude from this restaurant. It is very bad. Never go to this...

The good things first: the veggie gyoza were fresh and tasty. We had the veggie miso ramen. The noodles used in the ramen are of very high quality and so is the miso broth.

However, based on our experience and the reviews here, we came to the conclusion that the owner, a renowned ramen chef as he may be, does not really know how to make a good and satisfying vegetarian ramen. Our veggie ramen was basically an enormous pile of noodles in broth, topped off with some corn, a few pieces of mushroom and a few leaves of mix salad, which seemed like a handful of gemengde salade from Albert Heijn and did not match the taste at all. In other ramen places, like the one the Beestenmarkt, the veggie ramen contained copious vegetables, egg, mushrooms, tofu, sweet potato, etc. And it's cheaper too! To be honest, after spending €36 here, we were a little hungry and had more food at home.

The female waitress was particularly snappy, yes I would even say unfriendly. She seemed annoyed we had chosen to sit outside where it was difficult for her to see us and admonished us to come inside first next time to make our presence known to her. How about "Sorry, I didn't notice you, I hope you didn't have to wait too long? Here's the menu". The staff shout out their Japanese phrases when they serve you in such a snappy fashion that it almost does not seem Japanese. Please just speak English to me next time, or Dutch, even though the waitress kept talking back at me in English when I spoke to her in Dutch - and yes, I'm a native speaker. Never in Japan was I served...

A new franchise called Fujiyama55 has arrived from Japan, and I think it has great potential to grow into a more famously known hotspot amongst fans of authentic Japanese food.

Our first visit already started off with a very enthusiastic welcome from the owner, Hiro-san. As they're still in the pre-opening phase, the ramen was missing from the menu but that didn't stop us from trying out the numerous other dishes that were offered and accompanied by weekly specials. Think of specialties like tori karaage, takoyaki, mochi ice cream, assorted sushi, grilled mushrooms with yuzu and much more. The lack of clear pictures is attributed to the tasty dishes that were quickly gone before I thought of taking them..

Speaking of karaage, we firstly got the regular ones instead of the chilli garlic sauce version that we ordered, but the owner quickly corrected it and kindly served it to us on the house. With every served dish he was happy to explain them in more detail, and he regularly checked up on us if everything was in order. Moreover, many of the ingredients used in the dishes are also for sale, together with some fancy Japanese souvenirs.

Concluding remarks: the food is delicious and high quality, the service is exemplary and the ambiance is relaxed. We wish Hiro-san the best of luck with the newly opened store and will surely come back for the ramen that is...