JINYA Ramen Bar - Hilton Head Island — Restaurant in Hilton Head Island

Service was slow. Friend and I sat for ages after finishing our meals and eventually had to flag someone down to pay. Ordered a Jinya Bun and Takoyaki. I swear on everything that it was salmon in my Jinya Bun instead of pork. I tried to say something was wrong with the meat (even if it somehow was pork instead of fish there is something severely wrong if those two meats can be mistaken for each other) but the waitstaff was insistent that I was eating pork. I am not an idiot. Gaslighting a customer about the food they're eating is absolutely insane. If I had a fish allergy this could have been grounds for a lawsuit. The Takoyaki had an overwhelming rotten fish smell. Only managed to eat 2 of them before having to stop at fear of puking. Proceeded to have stomach cramps the rest of the night. My friend also ordered Takoyaki and reported an odd smell from theirs as well, but did not get sick like I did so it's unclear if the two facts are related. Will probably come back to try the ramen, but I definitely know what menu items I want to avoid now. Edit: Went back and tried the ramen with another friend. Two bowls of ramen with 3 additional add ons into one bowl (because the ramen itself comes with almost nothing) cost essentially $50. This is insane. The ramen itself was very mid, not horrendous but certainly not $50 worth. Soy sauce added to top ramen would probably have tasted better. Service was better the second time around however they were absolutely blasting music to the point where my seat was shaking from it. I had nothing against the music choice, or even restaurants playing music loudly, but I would like to be able to hear the person sitting a foot away. Factoring in everything I have previously written, I can safely say I will not be returning for a third time. Edit 3: The more I think about it, the worse this restaurant appears to me. The ramen had almost zero flavoring, and the add-ons actually somehow added nothing to the dish. I cannot possibly fathom how someone can eat at this restaurant and walk away thinking that it was good. The only possible explanation I can think of is most of the people who have eaten here have never actually tried ramen a day in their lives. Or maybe it's because it's one of the newer places to eat on the island so people will flock and fawn over something that is incredibly not worth it. How this place has so many 5 star reviews is actually baffling to me. A friend of mine attempted this place again via takeout, asked for a sauce, was promised the sauce was in the bag. When she checked the bag in her car and found it wasn't, she went back inside to ask for the sauce. The same server who promised the sauce in the bag said she was now going to charge my friend for the sauce, and that if she could bring the bag back inside to "prove" the sauce wasn't in there. This is actually insane. There is 250 places to eat on the island, and a wonderful selection of Asian based restaurant in that number. I've eaten all over, and feel guilty when I leave a 3 star review or lower but I don't find myself feeling bad about this one, the place is just that bad. Easily one of the worst places I've ever eaten. For the love of god choose somewhere else to eat. If you want ramen-focused restaurant that badly, you might just have to take the hit and...

Modern and trendy ramen bar, it felt brand new inside but I heard it has been open over a year. Clean and well taken care of space. Service was helpful and patient with our large group. The owner stopped by a few times and was a pleasure to meet and immediately took care of a small dietary issue we had overlooked.

The food was very good and portions felt right. I had the Jinya Bun, which was the perfect bite to start off the meal. The ramen was built on a classic rich and unctuous collagen thick broth. I opted for a soup using pork broth, which is maybe most traditional, but the other bowls I saw looked great too.

My ramen allowed me to choose my spice level from 1-10. I was informed most guests chose 1 or 2 but I like really spicy just shy of the point where it becomes difficult to eat. I took a chance and ordered an 8 to everyone's surprise, but in the end the heat level was perfect. It took a few sips for the heat to build, then a few more to get used to it as the initial hit of heat was intense. After that the ramen was delicious and ate easily enough. I had a good brow sweat going and felt fine the next day.

Additionally, I will say that the fried chicken is superb - Crispy, juicy, and well seasoned. The kids meal is an amazing deal, coming with more food and options and our 5 year old could eat and it was a great value.

In warmer months or daytime, the outdoor seating looked very attractive. There's a huge fireplace in the middle that could seat ~15 around it.

It's also right next door to a Kung Fu Tea which is a plus if you don't get dessert here. I was tempted by the green tea ice cream mochi though!

Finally, they have a small but nice bar if you'd like beer, a cocktail, or some wine...

I have nothing good to say 🤷 since they could never give us a table, I put myself on the list and the guy at the counter told us that we had to wait 30 minutes to be moved to a table since he explained that no they had a lot of staff" I imagine it was because they didn't have waiters, for us it was fine, we waited outside for 50mn and nobody didn't speak, but we realized that other people who were waiting had already seated us, we waited a bit more and more people came and they sat them at their table, that's when we went in to tell the boy what was happening with our table! to which he told me to give him 5 more minutes" and we did! we waited 20 more minutes and they passed another group that arrived after us, that's where we went back in and told him to cancel our table, because it was disrespectful to me that they never sat us down and a girl checked the list and he realized that they had been seated 3 tables after us" (it is worth mentioning that he realized why every time someone enters and there are no tables they ask for your name and every time they feel someone they cross it out) as it never happened with my name and even so seeing that I was not crossed off the list they sat more people in front of me! in total I waited 1 hour 30 minutes, so that in the end they only differed sorry! (it should be noted that we were only 4 people) so for me The boy who antantended me was rude and racist! Because at no time did he apologize knowing what he had done, for my part I will never return to that...