I usually don't review other branches of previously reviewed restaurants unless things are materially different and so based on that I had to write this review for the new Westside opening of Ippudo. Ippudo in the East Village is one of the most loved ramen places in the city. The East Village branch consistently has 2+ hour waits but it's definitely worth the wait. So I was super excited when they opened another branch in the city to give all of us another optioin. I met Anuja, Amy and Kristen there on a rainy Thursday night and luckily there was no wait at 6:30pm. Already a huge improvement! The space was a bit bigger than the one in the East Village; there's a huge bar when you walk in and then a slightly larger open space behind there. There's also a private upstairs room that is rumored to be a rotating pop-up space. We were seated in the main open space and excited to order our ramen and pork buns. All of us have been to the original one and already had our orders in mind. But when we opened the menu this is where some of us were very disappointed. You would think that the menu would be pretty similar to the other location but there were several items from the East Village menu that were missing from this menu. Specifically, they were missing the only vegetarian ramen on the menu. Both Amy and Anuja don't eat meat and were planning on ordering the wasabi shoyu ramen which is a soy and vegetable based broth. We thought that maybe this was a mistake since the restaurant just opened so we asked our waiter about it. He said that this branch's kitchen wasn't able to prepare the other kinds of ramen just yet. What?!? That makes zero sense and of all the ramens you were not going to have the only vegetarian one seems like the wrong choice. The waiter said "Well, you can have any of the other ramens, we can just not put the pork in there." Umm - but the broth is still pork based sir. Luckily both Anuja and Amy were trying to be flexible and agreed to go with the original version but with no pork. Then when Anuja asked if she could get egg instead to make her meal a bit more robust the waiter said they can't do that and that she would still have to pay extra for it. Umm - what again? I get that restaurants have a P/L to adhere to and that's why they don't like substitutes. But the fact that she's asking for a cheaper substitute, especially after they couldn't accommodate her original request just seemed like really bad customer service to me.
The good news is that the actual food for meat lovers is still just as good and delicious. Kristen and I split the pork buns ($9) which were the perfect combination of fat and meat and topped spicy sauce, mayo and lettuce. Yum! I got the Modern ramen ($14) with an egg ($2) which is the original broth topped with miso paste, slices of pork, cabbage, mushrooms, scallions and garlic oil. It was salty goodness and I devoured not just the noodles but all of the broth too. Comparing this experience to my recent take out one at Himawari, this has just confirmed my feeling that eating ramen hot and in the restaurant is the best way to do it.
If you're a pork eater, you'll be totally fine here but if not, then I would recommend still visiting the East Village one for now. While I usually focus more on the food than the service, their inability to be flexible and make the customers happy really irked me the wrong way. There are so many places in the city that will bend over backwards to make their customers happy and I was surprised that they were not one of them. By the time we left at 8pm, there was a substantial crowd waiting so if you are going to come here, still come early. Total bill: $43/pp with tax, tip and drinks
Photo Credit: Yelp
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