Formosa

The sushi is awesome, the staff is friendly, the environment is nice. I highly recommend this place!

Don’t sit at the bar unless you really want some solitude. The bar was mostly empty so it wasn’t exactly a busy night but the service definitely wasn’t about taking care of the customer. It was like Pavlov’s dog with the damn ticket machine. Also, IMO, if your bartender can’t strike up or hold a conversation she probably shouldn’t be a bartender.
Decent sushi but I think the «Las Vegas» is only their most popular item because that’s what they keep telling people.
Location is great and will try again, but maybe a table instead.

I’ve been to Formosa quite a few times, attempting to fill the Japanese food void in my heart after living in Osaka for awhile.
Their sushi is fine, it’s not absolutely amazing but it’s still good for what you pay for (especially for lunch or happy hour deals). My husband enjoys getting the spicy rolls and I do admit they’ve always been good. Their other dishes are fine as well (I like their traditional Udon, because it actually has shiitake mushrooms in it like it should).
The two stars however comes from service alone. I was going to dine here with my bachelorette party the night before my wedding. It clearly says they take reservations, and my maid of honor had made one ahead of time. When we got there, they insisted that they could not seat us before 9 PM. That was outrageous, and we could see plenty of open tables. After she spoke to the host up front, the host finally told us that they just simply did not feel like seating a group of seven people. We then had to attempt to find a new place to go on an extremely busy Friday night downtown.
When I go to a restaurant I expect good food and good service. The service was abysmal, and the food can’t make up for it if I can’t sit down to eat it! I do not plan to come back. If you make reservations ahead of time be warned: You might not actually have one.

If you want an Americanized sushi experience, this restaurant is a great option in IC. Most of the rolls include fried ingredients and you can hardly taste the fish.
Do not go here if you actually like sushi. This is not sushi. The quality of the fish is ok, but the rice is mushy/​low quality. Similar to the rolls, the poor quality of the rice overwhelmed the flavor of the fish.
To top it off they don’t even offer actual martinis on martini night. I tried ordering the least sweet option but even that left me with a stomach ache.

Absolutely delicious. I love the atmosphere, the staff, and especially the food. I’ll even buy Formosa’s sushi from Bread Garden if I don’t have time to go to the restaurant proper. Even refrigerated for hours it’s still the best sushi I’ve ever had.

I came here for dinner. Great sushi list that ranges from $ 5-​$ 15. There’s is a patio if you would like to eat outside and listen street performers.
Cons — Service is pretty slow. It took almost 40 mins. for 4 rolls :(If you are outside, you maybe be a bit neglected. A couple tables outside were also getting frustrated.

A huge group of friends and I used to make Formosa a weekly dinner until our last experience. We had a mess up on our check and was over charged, since they never keep experienced wait staff she had to ask who I assume was the manager for help. They were only a few feet away when he (an already off putting man) complained and gossiped about our «stupid» table as if the mess up was our fault. He then pointed at our table as he gossiped to the host for a good 5 minutes. How unprofessional! We will not be attending weekly anymore and I hope he knows returning customers are the reason he has a job in the first place.

Taking advantage of great weather, two of us lunched outside on the ped mall. We shared everything including the pork dumplings which were tasty with ginger soy sauce. Ordered California roll, salmon roll, salmon tempura roll and avocado roll… all were fresh and beautifully presented. The waitress was thorough and kind. $ 28.

Okay so I kind of cheated because we only went to their curbside table for taste of Iowa City. There was quite a line but it was worth the wait for this tasty sushi. I got two Vegas roll pieces and they were delicious. Nothing too spectacular but good. And the third one was the shrimp tempura roll. Kind of standard shrimp tempura, but tasty. Maybe we’ll go back and eat inside next time!

Formosa is one of my favorite sushi places in IC for at least 2 reasons:
Their vegetarian rolls are a lot more exciting than at other places. Lots of times vegetable rolls are overlooked by the restaurant and you are left with boring, plain rolls filled with avocado and cream cheese and maybe a few other vegetables. But not here! Very colorful, well garnished and tasty veg rolls! (Their regular sushi rolls are awesome too. I’m partial to the Rainbow, Spicy Yellowtail and Finding Nemo rolls.)
Weeknight specials! $ 3-​$ 5 rolls and drinks? Sign me up!
My only qualm is the weeknight specials. Sounds contradictory huh? Don’t get me wrong, I love their specials. What I don’t love is being seated in the un-​named «college kid section», a grid of tiny tables populated by undergrads trying to enjoy fine food on a budget. Those seats are so close, you can smell the bleach when they clean the table next to you.
But anything for sushi!

I can’t believe I waited so long to dine-​in at Formosa! I stopped in with a small group for lunch and the atmosphere was perfect. I especially love how open it is to the ped mall — hello, people watching!
The sushi was great but the star of the show was my loaded miso soup. Oh my, it was without a doubt the best miso soup I’ve ever had. I can’t wait to hunker down at Formosa now with a bowl of loaded miso soup while watching the snow fly.
#pleasedonthatemeformentioningsnowinaugust

It is pretty good. They had my uni which was great and reasonably priced. Not my top 5, and a bit on the pricey end especially for the soups.

Love Tuesdays and Thursdays when you can get a lot of basic rolls and martinis for $ 3!

Stopped in for a quick lunch on Sunday. The tuna and eel nigiri was fantastic! Other parties in our group had the Las Vegas and crunchy calamari rolls. Those too were excellent. Service was average and the table was a little dirty. Other than that, the food was very good and I plan on coming back to try some of the other items on the menu. Speaking of menu, it has a very large variety of sushi rolls and entrees. If the other items are of the same taste and quality of what we had this visit, we are in for a return visit for sure.

Pros:
1. Huge sushi menu! They have a whole page of basic sushi, a page for specialty, and a page for special sushi.
2. Nice modern atmosphere inside, the patio out front looks nice too but haven’t sat they before.
3. The sushi was high quality and the spicy tuna roll I had actually did have a kick to it.
4. The egg rolls were also very solid.
Cons:
1. My biggest complaint are the wood single use chopsticks. I wish they had higher quality chopsticks that they wash between uses.
Great sushi menu with lots of variety at various prices. Check them out!

Pretty solid place aimed at the young crowd. Lots of daily specials and fusion rolls. Not bad for being in Iowa. Get the salmon lover and the Formosa roll.

Formosa has very good sushi and the service is always very quick. Plating is also always pretty. All signature/​specialty rolls are very tasty.

Would love to give this establishment «5 stars» but the dishes were SOOOO dirty?!?
Formosa had the most savory rolls I have ever had. They are rich on sauce and barely needed any additional fixin’s. Each roll is a work of art. We also had the seaweed salad which was very tasty.
I had to send back the water glass because I could perfectly see the lip gloss from the chick before me-​GROSS. And we had to send back a couple of the plates because there were particles of food dried to the surface. Common people, I know dishwashers aren’t perfect but take a look at what you’re expecting others to use… at least send back and RE-​WASH?!?
Love the location. Right in the heart of downtown Iowa City. There’s some outdoor seating to enjoy those nice days and even from inside there is opportunity to do some fine people watching. It has access from outside but is also accessible from the lobby of Hotel Vitra?
Everything we had was delish– it was actually painful to finish the last roll because we were SOOO stuffed!

If you are trying sushi for the first time or already have a love for it then Formosa is the place for you. They serve other oriental food options other than sushi, but the sushi is the reason to go. I have never ordered a bad sushi roll from this place. The wait staff is very attentive and very knowledgeable on their food. Which helps in those indecisive moments. They also have a gluten free menu. My only criticism is their drinks seem watered down usually if I have a dirty martini on an empty stomach I am feeling a heavy buzz, but not from this place. Still their food is great and is a culinary experience I highly recommend.

There aren’t many phở options in Iowa City for some odd reason. But this is one of the places you can get it at. However, it is $ 15 a bowl… Never seen that price and phở before, WTP (What the Phock).
So we tried it is and first mistake is they don’t give lime wedges or peppers. They broth is just okay, a little fatty for my liking. The meat is fatty and chewy as well, not the best of cuts. Overall Phở is a 3.
Did try some crab Rangoon, which were pretty good but nothing out of the ordinary.
Very pricey place, seen the sushi menu was pretty high priced as well. Not sure if I feel the value is worth it here.