Sabu Ramen - Lakeland

I?m late on my review because sometimes I think it?s best to just be more vigilant in the process of coming to a well informed decision. First impressions had me initially, but consistency keeps me coming back. Anytime I need a bowl of comfort, Sabu Ramen is my go to tried and true!

You know a place must be pretty decent if there?s always a crazy long line of people waiting to order, pay and devour. Sabu is one of the handful of stalls in the industrial and fun Joinery of Lakeland. They do the ramen, and visitors seem to never get enough of the ramen. I?m so serious, this place is always crazy busy. Because of this I usually don?t even try to order here, because I?d rather not wait forever when most of the other stalls aren?t half as busy. So when itactually had no line one day that I came to yee old Joinery, I jumped on the opportunity. I got one of the spicy ramen dishes that I am now forgetting the name of. I really enjoyed it, and I mean it?s hard not to enjoy any ramen bowl. Iwouldn?t say it was out of this world, but I?d have it again happily. We got the bao buns too, of course. Can?t ever turn those sweet babies down. Let me now get to what I would drive to the Joinery solely to splurge on: the drinks!! Theyhave boba, yes, whoop whoop! I got the cocoa puffs cereal milk boba and it was ridiculous. Ridiculously easy to sip down so quick I barely savored it. It basically tasted like chocolate milk with soft, chewy boba that was cooked prettywell. Also, my friend got the iced matcha and that was by far the best matcha drink I?ve ever tried. I think they mixed it with some sort of sweet cream, because it wasn?t just the plain earthy taste of matcha but it was much sweeter, and Ijust can?t even believe how good it was. So yes, I?d come back to not even bother the ramen or bao buns, but to get a foo-foo drink from Sabu. But the ramen certainly doesn?t hurt either.

I gave this place 2 stars because it gave me ramen and fried chicken, the staff was friendly, and service was fast. However, here are my qualms with the food. 1) The soup base was not hot, just lukewarm. Ramen should be piping hot when served. The shoyu (soy sauce) base was lacking in umami (depth of flavor). 2) The chashuu was diced instead of sliced, resulting in drier, tougher meat. 3) Instead of serving the egg sliced in half, as is typical presentation, it was whole,and still had a chunk of eggshell attached to it. 4) The karaage (fried chicken) was not authentic at all. I do not know what it was coated in, what sauces were on it, or how it was prepared (it was also oddly tough, instead of moist). Ittasted good, but not like Japanese food. The food photographs well, but in all of my years eating ramen in the US and Japan, this was my least favorite ramen. Never again.

Pretty darn good. I get the chicken based tonkatsu and spicy chicken. Great bone broth flavor. The bun is the star. I've been three times in one month. Love bone broth. Get rice noodles as a gluten alternative. I've never had the wheat noodles.

Food was good, service was kind of douchey they have no patience which is interesting considering its foreign exotic food to most central floridians. The chicken broth i ordered for my kid had WAY TOO MUCH bonita flakes! it was like a sardine soup so it was inedible even for me and i love sardines. Ill come back for the buns but not the ramen.