Night Ramen — Restaurant in Colorado Springs

First of all, remember that we are in Colorado and not Osaka. Expectations need to be set. As far as “authentic ramen” goes I would say this misses the mark, but I’m not sure it is even trying to be that. The key to truly amazing ramen is the broth. Preparing true ramen is an art. I think the dishes here are really fun and an americanized expression of ramen. But with some small adaptations to the prep and menu it could really get that extra mile that is needed to consider this “upscale” and a palate pleaser. Hope the team considers this as I would LOVE to continue supporting some authentic asian flavors in town.

Ambiance: Great design and esthetic. LOVE the vibe. Really cool to see a place like this in the Springs. The concepts from this team continue to delight. Amazing job on the decor - definitely going to be a spot to go to and bring friends and dates. I would imagine this becomes the go-to tinder/bumble first date spot.

Service: 5 stars for effort. You can tell the front of house knows what they want to offer, but as with all openings - going to take some time to get there. I’ll definitely come back when the team has a chance to settle in. Service was attentive and fast, but was very disorganized and unrefined. I normally wouldn’t criticize this, except the owners described this experience as upscale which it really just is not. Modern chic is more attainable.

Food: Again, if I’m not comparing to authentic ramen this was okay. Prices are reasonable for what is offered; which is asian fusion with a heavy lean towards american palates. The noodles were surprisingly good consistency but broth was very underwhelming. Not bad, but not great. Again, some small tweaks and this could be so delicious. Loved the egg :)

Appetizers looked pretty good but didnt get to try them.

Drinks: Well, I’m confused. What are we going for here? I mean a great lychee martini would have been SO GOOD. It seems like someone went pun crazy with the drink names but didnt do alot of research. There are so many great drinks from Japan and anime that could make this drink menu the talk of the town. The bartenders were definitely “newer” so going to give them a pass. The drink prep was very amateur (my drink had an orange peal butt end… who does that?) balance was missing but booze was of good quality and interesting options. Again, if we are going for upscale, I think its a miss. Going for after hours ramen lounge - bingo nailed it.

Will definitely come back and see if I can rate this higher. Really excited for this to find its “happy spot”. Dos Santos and other concepts by this team have been so good, definitely rooting for...

First off, the food was very good and if it was only based on that it would have been a 5 out of 5 but unfortunately the experience we had was less than ideal.

It took 45 minutes before we got our appetizer, and an hour to get our food after ordering. We were sat at the community table near the kitchen and the other two parties at the table all ordered at the same time as us. The first group got their entrees almost immediately, then the group who ordered after us received two rounds of appetizers before or only appetizer arrived. Then our appetizer, then our food, then the third party's food. It all just felt off. All in all not a huge deal but the organization certainly seems to need work at least with the pacing.

When I was about 2/3's of the way through my bowl of ramen, a very tall stack of ceramic bowls fell off of the expo counter resulting in shards of them flying everywhere. I watched a small piece of one fly directly into my remaining ramen. When I let the server know she notified the manager standing right there who asked if I would like to finish this bowl or if I would like a partial replacement portion. I was surprised she was even willing to let me finish the bowl that had broken ceramic in it and at this point we were already almost an hour and a half into our time there and couldn't afford to spend any more time so I said no thanks to both of those options. While waiting for the check I found another piece of one of the shattered bowls in the fold of my sleeve, then was surprised to find a full price bowl of ramen on my bill that I was only able to eat a portion of.

We didn't make any stink of the situation at all because I always find it valuable to see how a business will handle problem resolution, and their idea of problem resolution leaves much to be desired.

Overall, I want to give them another chance because I could see very much enjoying this place but sadly our first experience was far less than stellar.

I left the sleeve shard...

Came here with a party of 9, catching up with friends who moved away. This place does not do reservations, and your whole party must be there to sit. We got lucky and had no wait. They also do not split checks. They said they could take multiple forms of payment, but it would be split evenly. Our tab was over $400. We had one person pay and just paid that person back. Keep this in mind. That was a shock and would keep me from coming with a big group ever again.

I ordered the honey deuces, it was more tart than I expected but was strong. I also ordered the Tokyo Shoyu because the pork sounded good, and it was! The pork was so tender and falling apart. The corn paired so well with the ramen and broth. I easily ate everything and left nothing behind. The spoons they gave to drink the broth were original and large. I loved the taste of the food and would like to try other ramen. Also the it's very pricey, so keep that in mind. The prices stopped me from ordering an appetizer.

I don't like how they do not make special requests on the food, so you can not remove anything. This would not be a place for a vegan, and they only have one vegetarian option. My vegetarian friend had to give her egg to someone else as they would not let her request to not have it. Hopefully, they are more kind to people with allergies.

The service was pretty slow, our waitress would disappear, and placing our orders took a while. We were there for 2 hours because of waiting to order and then waiting for the food to be served. I wanted to order a dish to go for my boyfriend, and by the time the waitress came back, I was done with my meal. But I ordered the shrimp tempura rice, and that was actually very quick, so luckily, my friends didn't have to wait on me. This was their opening week, so I know they were busy. I hope in time these kinks will be fixed. Maybe we will be back...