FuKu Japanese Cafe

Fuku is very nicely cute restaurant. The owners are the chef and manager husband and wife team. This restaurant has some characters that is pleasant to gather here. We have a group of 7 was easily seated comfortable.

Our food is came out rather quick. We have a spicy ramen to share. I like miso soup base ramen here. It is not too salty. The ramen is cook perfectly. The garnish is nice and they have fish cake in this ramen other than thin slice of pork. We have order the spicy tuna, sashimi and sushi combination, shumai, and the softshell crab bento box. Some good some average.

I like my experience here, the food is good value in downtown area. The service is good. I like this mom and pop shop that show the local color. This is good restaurant to have in this area.

FuKu Bich Nga. These are the names of two restaurants in Pinellas.

FuKu serves up homey Japanese ramen, sushi, bento boxes, shumai, and other goodies in a comfortable downtown Clearwater restaurant. There's a lil sushi bar and comfortable tables in a hip atmosphere artfully decorated space. Service was friendly and accomodating. The decor and lighting is modern, fun, and inviting.

The food was very good. Good value. I was happy.

Several types of ramen are offered. Lunch specials. Bento boxes including salmon and softshell crab. The batter on the softshell crab was thick for me. But still tasty. I love bento boxes!!!

The shumai were crispy outside and hot / moist inside. We had the spicy ramen and it was very good and tasty. Rich. Good ingredients like shrooms, fatty pork, egg, seaweed, and crisp.

Yaki niku!!! Awesome! I got the one bento box that includes yaki niku (Japanese beef), rice, gyoza, sushi (with avocado, cucumber, and "krab"). It also comes with a small salad and soup. Gotta say, I enjoyed it all (except I passed over the sushi because that's not my thing). Have I mentioned how much I liked the beef? Very tender and flavorful. I want a whole plate of it next time I go. The gyoza was also great. The soup and salad were also tasty. The green tea was the weak point of the meal. It lacked flavor but I appreciated the refills on it.

They have various kinds of ramen for all you ramen aficionados, sushi, various bento boxes and more (see the menu I posted which may be updated).

The decor was modern Japanese - I liked all the details they put into making it modern yet cozy yet Japanese. Wish they were in Tampa so I could visit more often...

This new place got beautiful interior design and the sitting was comfy. Among all the dishes we tried, the spicy pork ramen grabbed my attention. This was the only ramen broth I had not in the extremely salty side. Instead it's a bit sweet with just hind of spiciness. Noodle, pork, egg, vetget, fish cake were all cooked properly. The food came out fast and the presentation was beautiful. The material tasted fresh and the portion was good. The services were attentive. The owner said they will add more deserts and sake items in the future and wish us come back to try them.

I don't know Tony N (see older reviews), but it seems his experience and mine were similar. I ordered the shoyu ramen with beef and it was just okay. The bowl came out and it looked beautiful, however one bite in I had an overwhelmingly porky flavor. I chose the shoyu broth because it's supposed to be chicken based. I added the chili oil and that did a decent job of masking this pork flavor, the beef was not great. It wasn't seasoned well and very chewy. The noodles themselves I enjoyed.

The service was a bit odd, every time I would ask my server a question the other server in the back would pipe up and speak. They were both sweet, just a bit odd with the conversation thing.

The space however is beautiful. Its nice and quaint and beautifully decorated. There are nice little touches here and there without the decor being overbearing.

I won't run back to this place, but I definitely won't dismiss them quite yet...maybe in a few months I can update this review to a few more stars.

I read through all the reviews before I came here. I was kind of forced to come here because everything Sushi is closed on a Sunday at 1 o'clock when I wanted to eat in the afternoon.
The reviews are correct -the service is lacking. They do run out of things- out of the six rolls my party ordered they were out of the listed ingredients for 4 of them. We made substitutions.So that's a bummer.
However the sushi is fresh -excellent. It's a clean place -clean bathrooms -which is a big deal for me. I'll be back.

Giving 3 stars instead of 2 because I wanted to like this place so much. It's so adorable and it's a Mom & Pop which I'm all about supporting.

But I couldn't. First off, I didn't get asked to order drinks. I had to ask 5 min after he took our order.

Second is after I got my water I realized our miso soup hadn't come yet and so I had to ask our waiter for that too which he was not going to bring otherwise.

Third, the sushi rolls were so small it was ridiculous. They were 8 very small pieces.

Fourth, our food took 20 min which normally be fine. However the couple who sat down after we got our Miso soup got their food at the exact same time. Also, it was only half our order!

Fifth, I finally asked about our other half a couple minutes after I finished my sushi and he said they were about to make it!!! Then why did the couple who came way later get their full meal before mines even made??

Sixth, our friends wanted food also so we placed a to go order for them after we got our second part of our order. That's when the waiter tells us they don't have salmon. I'm sorry, then what did I eat in 2 of my sushi orders??? I asked and he said they would have just put in whatever fish they had back there!!!!!!!! Excuse me? I certainly hope not! What if I was allergic?!? Luckily he was just ill-informed.

So no, I'm sorry I could not like this place. On top of everything else, I'm still so hungry. 2 rolls has always filled me up at every sushi place I've been to. And this place only has like 6 tables yet I've been here almost an hour 1/2 just due to waiting for food. As I'm new to town I hope not all sushi places are like this.

Went there again and sat at the sushi bar. Thursday night, not too busy. Of course I had to get the ramen but started with some tuna and salmon nigiri. Very good. Thick pieces of very fresh fish.

Next, I got the miso pork ramen and wow I didn't think it could get better then last time but that pork was ridiculous. Tender and full of flavor with lines of fat you can see in it.

Got the miso broth and it was perfect I guess you say Umami. Not too salty and great flavor. You can also get seafood, salmon and tuna and scallops. The options are endless.

Service was excellent. We ended up chatting with the chef and I believe owner and he's super friendly and informative.

This will definitely be a regular spot of mine. Best Asian food in Clearwater in my opinion.

UPDATE: THEIR OUT OF BUSINESS

Fuku=Fukme, it's supposed to mean "good fortune" but I had none of that last Saturday afternoon from the most unappreciative staff and poorly run restaurant i've ever encountered. I thought I was on a hidden camera show or something, I believe that when you are in the restaurant business you should treat every customer like you are happy to see them, ESPECIALLY when you're a restaurant in "ghost" downtown Clearwater!, No?

A friend and I went in, we were greeted by a hostess that looked she would rather be somewhere only to disappear and without seating us, the place is really small and empty so we just sat at the second table to the last on the right as you come in.

When I sat in the chair and then tried lean back to relax it literally broke in half landing me on the floor and me looking straight up at the ceiling.....Hey, accidents happen I understand, although THIS has never happened to me in a restaurant in my life, well not sober anyways, and i'm not fat, I only weigh 170 lbs at 6 ft tall, sooooo.......but the response from the staff was zombie like, no one moved, no one said anything at all.... til I did, standing up on my own with the broken chair in hand, I don't think the girl making sushi, the one that tried to seat us and whom I highly doubt is a real sushi chef, even looked up.

We then sat there for about 10 min no menus no drinks, before the some extremely sweaty guy came from kitchen with dreads and no hair net with menus and reluctantly took our drink order, I ordered water with lemon that took another 10 min to get and I SWEAR to god the lemons were used! which will make sense when the waitress did finally get to us and the conversation that transpired next about blew my mind.

Waitress: What can I get you

Me: Chicken Ramen Noodles

Waitress: "We are out of chicken, in fact we are out of everything except pork"

Me: Ok thank you I think that's going to about it for me today, I am going to have to leave and come back when you have your ingredients and new chairs..........

Waitress: Oh we have chicken just not the kind that normally goes in that dish but I can have him just throw some of the chicken we have in the back in it, it's just not going to be the chicken we normally use which is marinated overnight and the owners not here so we are left with what we have and are out of everything as the owners working at another location......

.......or something to this effect because she talked fast and mumbled, also might add she didn't even look like an employee. She was wearing street clothes and just not professional looking or acting, at all, none of them were. Not one Fuku was given, so we left and went to Malino's Pizza place around the corner where the guy in there greeted us like family and not only served up the best tasting pizza I have ever had in Clearwater but a side of spaghetti and veggies. What a night and day difference. I think the fuku staff should have lunch there tomorrow and bring a notepad. That place won't be there another 6 months, a great idea but very poorly executed. Good luck to everyone and get some training or a clue.

I will also like to add that this whole time this was going on the cook in the kitchen, the only Asian on staff was giving us dirty looks through the food window, like he wanted to say something, man I sure wish he had.

Wow! The ramen tastes just like home! Literally... I buy the stuff they make the ramen with for when I want ramen at home. (I got the tonkotsu and I've had it a good amount of times to recognize the taste... You can even buy it on Amazon.)
They sure don't make the broth themselves.
Looks pretty but it's like taking a bougie version of Top Ramen and dressing it up to serve to the customers. Dagger to the heart, especially at $14 for lunch price... Really? Really... Oh and the pork was old...

Onto what my boyfriend got... Beef bento, they didn't bother cutting the beef, instead, it was just whole and tough and at $13, the price point was still a bit too steep for the small amount you get. Flavor was pretty good though. The sides... I prefer target sushi over that roll and the little potstickers actually had freezer burn. Overall, it was one disappointment after the next. Especially because the starters (soup and salad) were served AFTER the meal came.

The wasabi, however, is pretty great.

Service. Not the most welcoming staff. We stood around being ignored for a good while. I mean, at least a hello? I don't know if it was the waitress's first day at work or what but it took 20 minutes for the water to come. Another 15 for food. Oh, and they ran out of tea. I mean if it took that long for the water to come, couldn't they have used the time to make another batch from the box of tea bags easily spotted next to the beverages?
Upon walking into the restaurant, none of the tables were cleaned. And I do not exaggerate when I say that EVERY table had finished plates. And about only two tables were occupied.

So we sat at the bar where the sushi chef was, who was pretty professional and made a roll for a To-go order for a girl in literally no time flat. Impressive... For speed.

I've never been so sad paying for a meal costing ~$30. You want sushi or bento? Make the little trip towards Clearwater beach. You want ramen? Better off buying on Amazon. Same or better price points.

Sorry, FuKu, I really tried to like you. Great potential but it lacked tremendously in... Everything.