I hate to be negative about my experience, but I want to start out by saying that the bar cocktails are absolutely a hit. Favors, conception, and craft are all excellent and the star of my experience. The bartender, while not overly friendly, knew what she was doing and was attentive and professional. 100% great.
It does, however, feel like a bar that *also* serves food. The Shiro ramen noodles were not cooked attentively and almost seemed like they were made in the same bowl they're served in and had stuck together. A little purposeful crunch is good, but this was more just stiff and slumped. The broth was hardly there and fairly bland. All around generally low-flavor and low salt, but I asked for some chili oil and that helped. I had poached shrimp with it, so a total of $24 for a mediocre ramen isn't a good deal.
The kimchi salad looked like a supermarket bagged salad with a spicy vinaigrette. The vinaigrette was good, but the salad just... plain. Nothing was pickled, and it would have been nice to have something pickled in a salad with kimchi in the name. Roasting the edamame would have been a good start. Charring the mandarin slices. Pickling the radishes. All would have made it stand out more. For $10 this feels like it's priced about right for the effort.
The yuzu meringue pie had very little yuzu curd, and the pastry was limp, soft, and wet like it had been glazed with simple syrup. Most of what I tasted was the pastry. The meringue was fine and just the right portion. Again, for $11 this doesn't feel like a poor value just underwhelming.
All in all, if this place is trying to market as an affordable drinking spot that'll also sate your hunger for not a lot of $$, then it works, but I wouldn't recommend it as a restaurant.
