Tanpopo Ramen & Sushi Restaurant — Restaurant in Hales Corners

Being that it was our first time there, we didn’t know what to expect. What I especially appreciated was that we were told it would be a 30 minute wait, and that’s almost exactly how long it took. They were incredibly understaffed and as such there was a long wait to be seated. That said, as soon as we were seated we prepared for the worst and were like “omg it’s going to take an hour just to get any food”. How wrong we were. The two servers they had tonight were both equally fantastic! Holy smokes were they amazing! Once we were seated they took our order within five minutes and honest to God, within 15 minutes we had our appetizers. The service was incredibly fast. Let’s talk about the food as we got a lot:

Gyoza: Absolutely fantastic - delicious! Chicken egg rolls: Also absolutely delicious! Pork Buns: Not our favorite - salty and fell apart easily. Most pork buns have BBQ sauce but these had none. Suggestion: add BBQ sauce, remove the lettuce, add scallions. Spicy Tuna Roll: Different than what we are used to, but buy and large not bad :). Had two different sauces, not mayo based. Philly Roll: This was good! Tasty and well prepared. Tontoro Ramen: Filling but could use garlic - by no means was it bad - just missing something. Dan Dan Spicy Ramen: Similar feedback to the tontoro - needed garlic. Much better than the tontoro in that it has more flavor and spice - just needed more. Chicken fried rice: Pains us to say it, but this was just not good :-/. Needed a lot of work. Bland, the chicken tasted kind of old, and it desperately needed more color (I ended up adding some of my wasabi infused soy sauce from the sushi and it instantly was better). My suggestion = add some garlic, some diced carrots and corn, more scallions, sesame seeds, egg, and a hard sear on the rice to give it some texture).

All in all, through, we highly recommend checking them out. They are currently very understaffed but were up front about it. Once you were seated, it was like a well oiled machine. Service was truly fantastic! :-). We would definitely...

Good but requires improvement.

Stopped in about 7:30 PM on a Sunday night, and the place was dead. The only other people there, a couple, left shortly after I sat down. I just feel weird in any restaurant that's that slow and EMPTY.

Aside from the lack of patrons, the overall decor was Asian-themed but way short of authentic, not that I thought they were trying to be something that they were not or could not deliver. It was simply a typical, non-chain Asian restaurant (operating in a former Wendy's or equivalent).

Now, the awesomeness of the experience. The service was good, borderline great. It ought to have been after all, right? I was virtually the only patron. (A mother with two young children came in later followed by a pair of women toward the end of my dining.) The waiter was polite, friendly, expedient and attentive. The only complaint was that initially, when I was the only patron, he was way too attentive and then way too inattentive when the others arrived and I wanted to close out the check. A better balance was needed.

The food. I'm no stranger to Asian cuisine, at least not sashimi, sushi, stir-fry and the like, however actual Asian ramen was new. The miso ramen with pork was delicious. Without a comparable experience for reference though, I'll leave it at that. The hamachi carpaccio and yellowtail roll were flavorful, at least with the sauce and wasabi on the two respective dishes.

Bottom line, I've had better sashimi and sushi and overall a better experience elsewhere, yes, even on a Sunday night. I tried this place for two reasons: 1) proximity and 2) it served ramen, which I wanted to try.

I'd recommend giving Tanpopo a shot. Just manage your expectations. For the price-point it was good; I just rate primarily on food and without comparable experiences with ramen I'll limit my rating to 3/5. Lastly, I'll definitely give them another go-around later this year after I seek out...

This establishment has changed names to Tanpopo Ramen & Sushi Restaurant and has received a menu refresh, however it is owned by the same proprietors as the previously named Le Bistro Shanghai.

I was a bit skeptical when we first arrived as we were big fans of Le Bistro Shanghai. They always made their food fresh and was some of the best Chinese food around. It was priced accordingly, but we were never disappointment. At first glance, the new logo and to-go menus looked gimmicky and cheap, the drive through board was hand written on poster board and I thought this place had gone to the land of crappy corner Chinese food.

Once we got inside, my mood quickly changed. The place was busy and full of happy customers. We were seated just a few minutes after we arrived and give nice professional looking table menus. We were happy to find that they still had some of their old staples near the back of the menu such as General Tso's which we decided to split and order a couple of sushi rolls as an appetizer. Everything was presented beautifully and tasted great. I will mention that the fried chicken had a distinct taste of overused fry oil, but perhaps this was just due to them being busier than they expected, so I will return and report on that again at a later time.

The service was great and the food was good. I am glad to see this place has not become the the crappy corner joint I thought it had turned into. They still have some of the best Chinese food...