Isshido Ramen — Restaurant in San Diego

I will start this with I love ramen. I went here with my girlfriend because I've been waiting for months for the place to open and I wanted to wait til the crowds went down a little. We decided to have the special Isshido Ramen and the Black Garlic Tonkotsu ramen. We also got the gyoza and karage as appetizers. This was absolutely necessary as the bowls received were the smallest bowls of ramen I've ever gotten at any ramen shop ever. Out of 16 shops I've been to, I started out disappointed with how small the bowls were. As a first warning, our bowls of ramen actually came out before our appetizers so I will review that first. Upon looking at mine and my girlfriends bowl, I had barely gotten enough broth in the bowl to even get close to the noodles. While my girlfriends' bowl had so much broth that you all you could see was broth and some of the condiments that were floating on top. As much as I wish I could say it got better from there, I was severely disappointed after tasting the broths. The Isshido Signature Paitan ramen broth tasted like water, no flavor, bland milky-tan colored water. After tasting mine, I had to taste my girlfriend's ramen. At least her broth tasted like something. All I could taste was chucky black garlic oil, which is not supposed to be like that. There are supposed to be no chucks, but it completely masked the flavor of the broth and everything that was in her bowl. As a huge part of ramen is also getting the aromatics from the bowl , I decided to take a closer smell of both of the bowl. Mine, the paitan bowl, smelled like nothing, and my girlfriend's, the black garlic ramen, smelled like black garlic oil (of course) and canned watered down corn. I thought I was crazy and upon tasting the corn, it was definitely canned. I'll move on to the gyoza and karage now. These were actually have way decent and comparable to a middle of the road ramen shop. I will give this shop another try in a month or so to see if I went on a bad day or if this is really that bad. But right now, I cannot recommend this place. Someone from the restaurant please take some pointers from places like Menya Ultra ramen and Yakyudori and make a fantastic...

I love the PORK CHASHU BOWL, the Chicken Teriyaki Bowl and the Chicken Katsu Bowl. They are rice bowls and some of my favorite things here. The sauces aren't overly sweet and the whole bowl isn't soaked in sauce. I love that. I really like the red Fukujinzuke vegetables in them, and even the egg was especially good. I like to leave the Seaweed and Kimchi off so the flavors don't take over. The Chashu Bowl had big chunks of pork that were full of flavor, tender and delicious. I love the sauce on it too. It's my kind of bliss. 🥰

The CUCUMBER SALAD was magnificent. It is slightly spicy and so flavorful. The Short Rib Steak Appetizer was really good too; together they make a nice meal. Or the steak and their fries were great together.

The spicy TAN-TAN RAMEN was wonderful with both the ground pork and the Chicken Chasu. I didn't know Ramen could be so delicious! I didn't even consider myself a Ramen person, but I was craving more the minute I finished them. I love the ground meat in the Tan-Tan. That alone had a unique flavor compared to other Ramens I have tried.

The TRUFFLE RAMEN is definitely one of my favorite ramens because of the unique broth. It already comes with mushrooms. That broth is really rich and satisfying.

The BLACK MAYU RAMEN was good. The broth was complex and full of flavor; and the ingredients were so fresh. I like the thin noodles.

The MISO RAMEN was good, comforting and no spice if you want that. The same with the CHICKEN PAITAN. The chicken is pretty plain compared to the others. I usually go for more flavor, but these two might be the perfect thing for some people.

I appreciate that they are open all afternoon, and don't have tricky hours to remember. And I like how there are so many ways to customize your Ramen and so many different kinds! I am having fun working my way through the menu. The food may not rock your world, like it did mine. But it's good and solid and definitely worth a try. Especially if you are already a...

I took my family to try this place out just now and I would say my tonkotsu noodles were good. It was very overly sour and after I added my cup of water in it, it made it into a perfect broth. I remember a member of my party looking at me puzzled, but I joked that more flavor is better than less (little did I know). I started devouring my bowl and I noticed my family eating pretty slowly which was uncharacteristic of them. I tasted one of their bowls which tasted like water and I was shocked. I remember the assistant manager asking how it was and I just had to intercede and explain that there was no flavor. There were four water ramen bowls for my family that they messed up on and the assistant manager did apologize and gave us a generous 15 percent discount. I guess it’s just the soft opening and I would urge anyone reading this to try them later when they get a hang of things (maybe much later). I also didn’t mention that the service was slow, they forgot an appetizer, but to their credit it was a packed restaurant. I’ll probably try them again later too since I did enjoy my bowl (in front of my family 😕), but for now this rating stands as a generous one. Anyway I do love experiences and it was the first I have tasted water...