IchiUmi Sushi & Ramen — Restaurant in Austin

Edit: I originally rated this place 5 stars and I am leaving my original review below. This restaurant also has a sister restaurant that specializes in sushi, while this one specialized in ramen. However, it seems they recently changed their menu to remove a large chunk of their ramen options and bowls and have now switched to a more sushi oriented place, with a small focus on other Japanese dishes. The sushi was okay. Not great, and defintely not even comparable to the other location. It seems their best food is the non-sushi options, but with less focus on that side of the restaurant, their menu had little to offer in choice. Additionally, some of the art still reflects the old menu options.

------ old review ------

I've been to a few Ramen places and honestly this one is the best of the bunch. They have many great broth options and amazing portions. If you do the Don Katsu ramen bowl, not only will you get ramen but a delicious pork cutlet on the side. The prices are good, especially when compared to other ramen places, and especially for the amount of food you get.

They also have other options. While mostly a ramen place, my favorite is pork belly with egg and a bowl of rice (Chasu Don). Simple, but the richness and flavor from the pork belly is complimented by the rice. Out of their "skewers", their bacon wrapped asparagus is a must try. If you come during lunch, get the best of multiple worlds with one if their bento boxes. Garlic edamame is delicious, as well as their Gyoza (dumplings) for a starter - we had the chicken Gyoza and it was delicious.

Simply put, everything is great here and you'll be hard pressed to...

Deliciously authentic Japanese food seemingly adapted to American tastes only by increasing the amount of food in the bento box. I had the three-skewer bento box, and the size--double my expectations--surprised me. I tried to make my skewers as authentic as possible and went with chicken hearts, pork belly, and Surfside clams, but there are tamer options available. All this was preceded by a bowl of miso soup that tasted more like miso than any I've had before. As a die-hard squid fan, I had to try the calamari appetizer, and as all squid fans know, there are squid that look like polite little onion rings, then there are squid that look, taste, and chew like real squid, and Hanabi's belong to the latter class. The bento box had a salad in one corner, and some sliced sushi rolls next door. The skewers lay suspended over a bed of sticky rice. And there was a dessert compartment in this sprawling bento box, and, strangely enough, there was a Chinese corner with a delicious egg roll and wonton--maybe it's a nod to Americans who haven't yet discerned the vast diversity in Asian food. My waiter was kindly attentive and kept my iced tea glass full...

3 of us got there around 1:30pm in the afternoon today and the place wasn't busy but seemed understaffed. We stood around for 5 minutes until we were seated, then placed our order. After waiting for about 30 minutes, at 2:03pm we reminded the staff that we placed an order for an appetizer (chicken gyoza) that hasn't come out yet. The staff was unapologetic and seemed to not care. After the appetizer came out, we waited some more until we asked about our orders (not big, just 3 ramen). Another staff, again unapologetic, told us that she would check on our order, then didn't come back to us to update us on our order. At this point, we've been waiting for 40 minutes. We arrived at the restaurant at 1:30pm, and left without food at 2:15pm. I've been here a few times alone, and I have not received a complain-worthy level of service before. However, this time I had brought my friends, and I was embarrassed and furious. We would have waited longer if the staff was more friendly or at least a slight bit apologetic. We never heard the word "I'm sorry" or anything that resembles that. I will not visit this...