Bobalicious, Iowa City

A restaurant with Vietnamese food in Iowa City! Pho! Bahn Mi! This is very exciting news. I know, I am late to discover it, and I beg forgiveness for that oversight. In my defense, it is nestled in what up until this year has been a relative restaurant wasteland of strip malls, gas stations, and big box stores that skirts the bottom of Iowa City proper. But discover it we have, and while the menu is modest, we liked everything we had on our first visit.

The Vietnamese spring rolls (fresh and wrapped in rice paper), which are available at other restaurants in town, are the best of the bunch. They are a bit smaller, and have more herbs rolled into them--excellent, and at $2.50 for two, they are a good deal as well. The Vietnamese egg rolls (what you might think of as spring rolls, with mung bean noodles as well as vegetables) are excellent, but again, not something we couldn't have someplace else in town. The bahn mi menu, with six options for fillings, does stand out. We have have one restaurant (Mekong) that on occasion has had one bahn mi option. This is a reason to celebrate! The sandwich we had (the traditional slow cooked pork version, with pickled vegetables and fresh herbs) was fantastic. I was serious when I said I could eat there the very next night, it was that good. On top of that, they also have bun thit nuong--hurray! This cold vermicelli noodles with fresh vegetables underneath, and highly spice meat on top is a favorite of mine (especially when they slice up an egg roll or two on top, and you can get that here). But wait, that is not all. The pho is very good, and they have several other Vietnamese dishes with rice. The restaurant started off as a boba tea shop and expanded from there--these do look very good, and I saw them scooping fresh avocado into the blender to make one, so they are not drinks coming directly out of a mix either. Once I get brave, I would love to try the durian boba In the meantime, I am going to exhaust the menu's options.