Ika Ramen — Restaurant in Omaha

I’ve been waiting awhile to leave a review of this location hoping that they’d improve permanently, but after yesterday’s experience I feel like the time has come. It seems like I can’t visit Ika without some sort of off-putting weirdness happening either to or around me, usually instigated by a member of the wait staff. The food is mostly on point (minus one episode where my wife was served rice that was clearly spoiled, then argued with when she pointed it out). Preparation and portion varies day to day, though. Sometimes the char siu is chewy, sometimes the brussels are swimming in so much sauce the dish gets gloppy. The tuna tots are different every time we order them. Sometimes the dishes are so salty they're hard to enjoy (and I'm a big fan of salt). In short, every visit’s a little bit of a gamble.

Yesterday’s visit was dotted with enough little weird interactions that I’m going to reconsider giving Ika business. These are things that wouldn’t be worth mentioning on their own, but all together add up to a strange experience.

On entering, our party of two was instructed by the guy behind the bar to take one of the two-person tables either in the back or towards the front. I went toward one of them, and he felt the need to reiterate that we needed to take the two-person table, not the four-person table next to it. Maybe they have a problem with small groups taking bigger tables, but if that’s the case (and it’s an issue for your business), then have a host in charge of seating.

A party by us sat down with a can of Pepsi they brought from outside. The guy at the bar very quickly told them that wasn’t allowed, took the can and threw it away. This doesn’t necessarily have to be a negative exchange, but the brusque way he did it made it weird. It seemed like this could have been handled better.

Our waiter (the guy behind the bar) was a little too much into casual swearing. He dropped an f-bomb during our first 10 minutes, and while explaining how the menu works with a table next to us, he said he likes to be as clear as possible how the small plate concept works because the menu’s “all just Japanese bullsh#t.” The casual swearing is one thing, but more importantly it's a little weird to diminish the language and culture of the country whose food you're serving.

After placing our order, I handed the menus to the waiter. He promptly put them back down on the table, saying “these have to stay here.” I wouldn’t normally take issue with this, but full-size menus on a two-person table take up a lot of room and are clearly in the way. I was tempted to use mine as a placemat. Again, there seems to be a rule about this handed down from management that the staff gets in trouble if they don’t follow.

The icing on the cake: when the bill came, we found that they’d “enhanced” the tip options to 20, 25 and 30 percent (rather than the customary 15, 18 and 20 percent). It’s pretty brazen to ask for 30 percent at the best of times, but after such weird service it’s laughable.

A note on how expensive they are in general: Since they opened just a few years ago, Ika’s prices have been creeping up at a very noticeable rate. I got a wild hair and decided to look up some prices at ramen shops in one of the most expensive cities on earth, NYC. Ika might be $1-2 less expensive on average than NY, where food costs are 43% higher and the overall cost of living is...

UPDATED 2/23 (4 Stars): Ika seems to be getting back to the quality I know and love. Hoping to have a few more consistently good bowls before giving the 5th star. I would once again recommend stopping here or ordering to go! The last 5 bowls I’ve had have been up to snuff over the last month so I would say whatever was wrong with the kitchen has been remedied!

UPDATED 12/22 (2 stars): I added a second star as since the initial 1 star review in 8/22 I have been back to Ika and had an on par delicious bowl of Tonk. I’ll add stars as I have consistent experiences again.

Original 8/22 (1 star): I’m so heartbroken to do this.

I cannot in good conscious recommend Ika ever again. I’m a former golden ticket holder (to those that don’t know, you buy a golden ticket and can get a free bowl of ramen daily for a year, 2021) and in 2020 used to go every Friday night: I know the Tonkotsu ramen. I know broth quality varies day by day because it’s homemade.

But a few weeks ago my ramen was NOT quality in anyway. My small plates were amazing and spot on. The ramen broth held no flavor. I have had Maruchan microwave Tonkotsu broth with more flavor than my Ika bowl.

Zach was amazing as always and gave me the same quality service he’s been giving me since mid-2020. This review is in no way a reflection of the waitstaff. Ika always has exceptional people: Zach and Whitney being star veterans of note.

To be clear once more: my partner’s Niku Udon that night was good. My two small plates of pork belly steam buns and Tokyo fried chicken were both amazing. Heck, even my toppings on my ramen were great.

But we all know the heart of a bowl of ramen is it’s broth.

I’m leaving this poor review in a desperate plea to the owner of Ika: FIX IT! This is your most popular ramen and you are going to lose business if this is not remedied.

I have made Ika a staple for friends who visit from out of town for hospital visits, conventions, shopping trips, etc. I have sung the praises of this place since my first visit on my 21st birthday in April 2018.

I have had bowls of ramen better at Ika San, and I tell people to NEVER go to the downtown location because their quality has always been garbage in comparison to the Benson location. Now I’m not so sure.

I’m happy to change this review to the 5 star it was meant to be made as years ago if the broth quality goes back to the Benson standard.

Until then: VISITORS BEWARE. If they no longer care about the quality of their most popular bowl of ramen, who knows how long it will take for the quality of the rest of the...

Tbh I really do enjoy this place. But I do want to be honest with people.. I've gone quite a bit now and everytime I go, it becomes less satisfying. Like for example I went there last night with friends and there was 3 tables other than ours. They had gotten their food and had been tended to. We order our food after like a 15 min wait and I never understood this, but everytime, I always get my main meal before my appetizers that I order. Anyways we ordered ramen along with 2 pork gyozas and a kimchi tempura appetizer. We got our ramen first then like I said only 3 tables there, that have been tended to already. So we finished our ramen and I even put on a timer on my phone to see how long it would be for our gyozas and tempura. The waitress said our appetizers would be out in a few minutes. We ended up waiting almost an additional 20 min or so. Then I actually never got my kimchi tempura and she tried charging me for it. Overall, all the servers there have a pretty bad attitude towards their customers. Our gyozas were also burnt. Like BURNT and we called the Japanese waitress over asking about it and she said that it's supposed to be like that. Now I'm Japanese, which is where gyozas originates from and never have I heard of burnt gyoza. Again it was clearly burnt.

I do enjoy this place alot, I always try to give the place another chance over and over but like I said the server staff is honestly bad. (Other than one girl with tattoos and short hair- she is the best by far there.)

I'm a server myself so I understand if you're having a bad day or if you genuinely make a mistake with orders, but it's happened the past 3 times and counting. Along with the table next to us complaining about the wait on appetizers so they ended up canceling their order overall. I really dont know anymore about this place. So yeah... I just thought I'd...