Ramen Shifu - Abando — Restaurant in Bilbao

Going early, around 7:30 PM, has its perks as you might just have the whole restaurant to yourself! It gave us the chance to really enjoy the manga-themed interior, which adds a fun and immersive touch to the dining experience. We got welcomed by friendly staff.

A nice beginning was the small complimentary bowl of chips.

Although it's called Ramen Shifu, the restaurant offers more than just Japanese ramen. The menu includes starters like kimchi, rice dishes, and even a 'tantanmen', which gives it a bit of a fusion vibe. The variety reminded me of Takumi, another well-known ramen chain.

Here’s what we ordered: a portion of kimchi, veggie gyoza, chicken curry rice, and ramen with deep-fried ebi prawns. For dessert, we had mochi in two flavors—green tea and sakura.

The food was tasty overall, though some dishes were a bit too salty for my preference and could have used a bit more depth in flavor. The noodle texture was good and springy 🙏 I really appreciated that the deep-fried ebi prawns were served on the side rather than in the soup, which kept them nice and crispy instead of soggy.

The mochi desserts were beautifully presented and had a...

📍 Location: 5/5 In the city centre

😋 Taste / Quality: 5/5 Great mix of flavour in each dish. I love the bottles they have for the sodas, feel like they taste better!!

🍽️ Selection / Variety: 5/5 lots of options to choose from!

🧼 Cleanliness / Ambience: 5/5 super clean and I love all the posters and how it’s decorated was really cool vibe.

💁 Service / Staff: 5/5 the staff was exceptional and really friendly and helpful and spoke perfect English. They gave us bibs and provided us with a charger to charge our phones which I thought was really helpful and sweet.

💸 Value for Money: 5/5 great value for money. We were 3 of us and spent around €20 each getting starters to share and a full main dish which was a huge portion size.

📝 Description:

Why I went: Lunch with friends while waiting to get bus to the airport and walking around the city

What I enjoyed: I really loved the ramen and seaweed but mostly enjoyed the decoration of the restaurant and the soda bottles! Also they gave us bibs so not to dirty our clothes which I found super cute.

Would I come back / recommend: Yes 1000%!

✨ Overall Rating:...

We started with a Toriman Teriyaki as an first dish (to share between 2 people), and they were good, a bit dry on the filling but the dough was tasty. Then we ordered 2 ramens, a spicy fried chicken ramen and an inferno ramen. Both had good flavor, but the broth (soup) of the inferno was a bit lighter than the fried chicken (we think it’s because of the peanuts in the last one).

The spice levels are just right; we ordered the fried chicken with level 2 and the inferno with level 3. A level 3 is pretty good for someone used to spicy food who doesn’t want a dominant spicy flavor (although the level is relative to each person).

The service is great, very quick, and friendly. We’ll definitely return later to try a more consistent broth in another of their...