Kokiyo — Restaurant in Newport Beach

Geez..... what do I have to say about this place. I was really excited to try this place out due to some buzz on TikTok, boi this was the biggest let down I have ever experienced. We went on May 15th around 7p.

Upon arrival we did not receive a greeting or nothing; although they did have a substantial line and were pretty busy. To order they expect you to place your own order at a kiosk, which is no problem I don't mind but if that's the case orders should be flying out to the customers. Nah nah nah nah...... they thought a 45 minute wait was okay. No apology or acknowledgement of the wait, okay I'll take it. But if you are going to make me order myself and wait 45 minutes this food better be bussin bussin. Nope DOG WATER. There were a total of 4 workers working but only 2 struggling in the kitchen 1 of which was the owner. I'm just saying but if I have a line out the door and we're are in the middle of a rush wouldn't you want all hands on deck and not 2 workers in the back doing god knows what?

We ordered 1 Creamy Ramen w/ Chashu and 1 Clear Ramen w/ Chicken, and finally potstickers.

To start with the Creamy ramen it was not creamy..... and the broth tasted bland and like pork water. No depth of flavor and barely any salt. I'm sure dog water probably had more flavor than this. Noodles trash. Ramen noods are supposed to be nice and curly with some chewiness to allow for the broth and aromatic oils to be scooped up as you eat. Bruh these were like spaghetti noodles ahhh heck no!!!!! Clear ramen was worse. This ramen was on another level of bland.

Now on to the potstickers; I wouldn't know how good they were since they ran out. When we placed our order we didn't know that they were sold out if I knew I wouldn't have ordered them. Upon recieving my order we were not told as well. So they were going to take our order and not offer an apology or acknowledgement hmmm sus. On top of that when I brought this up to THE OWNER he said he would refund and continued to apologize profusely. I don't want an "I'm sorry" I want you to be better. It is May 22nd and I have yet to receive my refund on potstickers. I'm not pressed about the money, I'm pressed about the experience.

The last point I want to make is that this place has a total of 3 items on their menu. If that's the case you would think these 3 would be exceptional. We tried both types of ramen and they were lackluster and we didn't receive potstickers so if 2/3 of your menu was not great then what does that say about your establishment and at that point what excuse do you have for a 2/5 stars. This place has potential to be a great hole in the wall which I see from the great review but suffers from poor organization, lack of customer service and flavor. Plenty of my concerns would be disregarded if the ramen was bussin bussin or the customer service was amazing. But nah. 2/5 I'll be back May 15th 2025 to give them another shot but until then I stick with Hiro Nori and...

I would give this place zero stars if I could. My boyfriend and I saw this place on Instagram and were excited to try this place today. I drove 30 minutes to get here from Long Beach and wish I didn't. We walked in and weren't greeted at all and just placed our order on a kiosk.

When we sat down, a worker (white, brunette girl) informed the family of three next to us that they only had three ramen noodle packs left (it was only 12pm and they were already out of ramen) and that my boyfriend and I would be getting 2 of them since we ordered first. Which I thought was fair, until she came over to us 2 minutes later and told us the same thing and that we had to choose either udon or rice noodles instead. She acted like we had not heard what she just said to the other family and I said I thought it was going to us since we ordered first. She immediately got an attitude and just told us to pick either udon or rice noodles and ignored what I said. I don't know what the other family told her and how they got the ramen and we didn't, but when my boyfriend asked if we could at least have one bowl of ramen, she said the family has to have all three. She gave us the opinion to just refund our order instead of just giving us one of the ramens, and clearly doesn't care about business. The family next to us was very rude and literally turned their backs to us because they knew what they did was wrong. We should have both gotten ramen since we ordered first and the family wouldn't even spare us one bowl of ramen.

We went up to the counter to get our refund and the worker didn't even acknowledge us as she brought the three bowls of ramen to the other family. She finally came to the counter and didn't say a word to us or apologize for the inconvenience. I have never left a bad review on Yelp before, but I was very upset after driving 30 minutes just to get no food and terrible service. It's a shame because we were both excited to try a new place, but it's safe to say we will never be coming...

This tiny little hole in the wall has literally 5 things and 5 things only on their menu. And I mean that in the best way possible. You know any place with a small menu are the best places to eat. Ain’t no way you can stay in business if your one item you serve is bad. The food here is fantastic

They have 3 appetizers: chicken tenders, chicken potstickers, & impossible potstickers. 2 entrees: chicken ramen with clear broth or chicken ramen with creamy broth. The ramen can also be served with Chashu for $1.50 extra or with tofu instead of sous vide chicken

We ordered one of each ramen and the chicken tenders. I never had ramen that was so rich yet so light at the same time. Tonkotsu to me - is overrated and way too heavy. I want decadence without the guilt which I never thought was possible till I had this ramen. My only wish is that the ramen had more meat but that’s ramen in general, ramen is never served with a lot of protein. My last rec is that the eggs were soaked longer for more flavor. The eggs were slightly bland but still good. I think the broth could use just a TOUCH more salt to bring out the flavor better. The broth and chicken were the stars of the show

They also served pink lemonade and Thai tea slushies. Slightly too much ice for me but still good

To top it all off, the prices are reasonable (almost too reasonable) about $14 for a large bowl of ramen, and the service was phenomenal. Expect to wait about 10-15 minutes for your food as everything’s prepared fresh. I think I’ll be back again today lol

To the guy (Thien Win) who gave the bad review bc his pee was discolored after eating… pls don’t blame this delicious ramen for...