Jasmine Deli
Restaurant, Caterer
$ - inexpensive
Vietnamese
A small, cheerful, and very veg-friendly Vietnamese restaurant
Jasmine Deli is a small, very clean, and cheerfully bright Vietnamese restaurant. The owners have done a great job at accomodating vegetarians, and basically everything on the menu can be made vegetarian, including noodle soups, sandwiches, noodle salads, and rice dishes. The prices are quite low, with most entrees in the $5-6 range.
They also offer some traditional desserts, like warm sticky rice wrapped around banana, and rice flour balls filled with coconut and peanuts.
Bring cash or your checkbook when you visit, because they don't take credit cards.
Added by Dave Rolsky on Mar 14 03 (updated Feb 1 04)
Reviews
Absolutely the best in terms of simplicity, taste and freshness.
Jasmine Deli is the in-the-know spot for people looking for authentic, light, tasty and home-cooked Vietnamese food. The service is always friendly and fast and there are numerous vegan items, including mock duck curries, cold salads, huge bowls of noodle soup with tofu, stir-fry rice plates and my favorite for quick-eats, the mock duck baguette sandwich (if vegan, specify no butter). All of their prices are under $9 and the sandwiches cost only $3 and make a great meal. Two issues, though: they don't accept credit cards and they have highly limited seating. Otherwise, this is the gem of the many Vietnamese restaurants in Minneapolis.
Best Vietnamese food in town.
Also, try Jasmine 26 around the corner -same owners- they make bubble tea with booze in it!
PLEASE try the mock duck spring rolls. the mock duck is a little bit warm, and they are served with delicious peanut sauce and very fresh greens.
i love vietnamese food and jasmine deli is my new favorite restaurant. ever since i had the vegetarian pho with mock duck it is all i can think about! i love the traditional noodle dishes. these are jasmine deli's specialty and it is one of few places where you can them 100% vegetarian, even vegetarian broth.
It is one of my my favorite restaurants - I've gone on my birthday for the past two years and plenty of times inbetween. They have the best veg spring rolls I've ever had. I almost always order a mock duck rice noodle salad, because it doesn't get any better than that. My husband almost always gets the veggie broth soup with rice noodles and fried tofu - he loves it. The praises of the mock duck sandwiches have already been sung, and I concur. Jasmine Deli is a little slice of heaven here on earth.
UPDATE: Jasmine Deli has recently expanded their menu - they now have curried mock duck rice noodle salads and some sort of soup that's made in a clay pot. The curried mock duck salad is even better than the original!
The food was very good but selection limited. It was difficult to figure if there were any vegetarian or vegan items by looking at the menu - I would have left after looking at the menu had it not been for vegguide. The prices are cheap, but the portions much smaller than a sit-down restaurant. I ate outside (they have a few small tables outside) on a nice day and the area has a nice ambience.
Great food at a great price. The server was very helpful in helping us to select a tasty vegan meal that we enjoyed.
I cook Vietnamese foods, and the dishes here are very well made as far as Vietnamese cooking goes. The springrolls, beside a nice choice of rice paper, has a very harmonious flavor between onion-stir-fried mock duck, mint, bean spouts and vermicelli. Try them without the sauce, you'd be able to tell; and the sauce is not overly dominating the taste of the springrolls. Both broken-rice and vermicelli dishes are prepared to my taste. The immitate fish sauce got me freaked out for a second (smile) but I guess somehow the restaurants want to keep at least the presentation of the dish the same, since they can't do that with the taste, as its counterpart meat dish. I also love the soy bean drink, which is just the way I had in Vietnam. It's different from that of Chinese restaurants and of course the American version. Just perfect.
the menu is very small but the soup is really the best rice noodle soup i have had anywhere! they also have sandwiches that are good when you are not insanely hungry.
it is really cheap for how good it is. one of my favorite places.
It's taken me a while to jump on this bandwagon, but once I figured out what bits & pieces I didn't like about a dish I can now ask them to be modified to my liking. The owners are very, very accomodating and very, very friendly. And you really can't beat getting a mock duck sammich that tastes that good for so darn cheap.
with vietnamese cuisine, you often get an assortment of garnishes, sprinkles, sauces and kickers with the meal, which appeals to those of us who enjoy choose-your-own-adventure types of dishes. i think of it as being allowed to participate with the chef in the food preparation, by adorning it and tweaking it with final touches until it is truly and personally complete. you usually get things like bean sprouts, cilantro, jalapenos, peanuts, shredded lettuce, etc.. which all are good, but really don't vary too much between restaurants (i.e., how do you screw up -- or distinguish -- sprouts or sliced jalapenos?). not to mention all the rice noodles everywhere, which are also hard to get wrong..
so it is the house sauces, the marinades, the breads, the broths, the mock ducks that seem to me to be the key to what makes a good vietnamese restaurant. and in that area, jasmine deli is fantastic! the banh mi sandwiches are so good that before i was half done with trying my first one, i was scheming for an excuse to go back very soon and have another one. the mock duck is very tender, and scantily dressed in a delicately sweet, seductive marinade. the bread itself is delicious, too, with a good chewy/crusty balance. i have yet to try the noodle soup, but i did have the rice noodle salad, which was also very good. the spring rolls were the only thing i found to lack distinction (although they are still tasty).
so really, who cares, i could eat sprouts and noodles all day long, anyway -- standard or not.. so when places like jasmine deli step up and deliver beyond that, it's a bonus treat. oh yeah, and this place is insanely cheap, too (especially the sandwiches).. sprinkle me up!
The Jasmine Deli is my new favorite restaurant! The menu is reasonably priced, they have expanded their menu with more vegetarian items, and they will gladly accomodate vegans as well. Although everything on their menu is great, my two favorites are definitely the vegetarian noodle salad with mock duck, and the veggie sandwiches! As if the tasty food wasn't already enough, the restaurant is always cheery, sparkly clean, and the two women that run the place are simply delightful!
The spring rolls are filled with rice noodles, herbs, mock duck, and sauteed onion, and were fresh and tasty. The sauce they come with is also good, and is not sickly sweet, something I often find at Vietnamese restaurants.
The noodle soup was also quite good. It's a large bowl of light shallot-base broth with rice noodles, bok choy, cilantro, scallions, and your choice of tofu (fresh or fried) or mock duck. It comes with bean sprouts, lime wedges, and fresh hot peppers which can be added to taste.
The rice and noodle dishes are basically the same ingredients, with rice or noodles, but are fresh and tasty. The veggie sandwich is delicious, and the bread is excellent. Recently, they made stir-fried rice noodles for us, and hopefully that will be added to the menu soon.
Update: it turns out the noodles they used were egg noodles. Yuck.
Current favorite restaurant. Tiny place with 10 tables maybe. Super limited menu, with only a few veg items. The thing is, they nail them. Everything is so good. Mmmmm, Mango Bubbletea.
Went on the recommendation of other reviewers in this forum, they ain't lying!!
Joe Vegan recommends: Go at your first opportunity and keep going!
I asked for a vegan version of the soup and it was good. I asked for the vegan version of their noodle salad and it was great!! I haven't gotten around to having the sandwich yet; I keep having the salad.
Jasmine Deli is great! It's true they can make almost everything vegetarian. AND the woman who owns the restaurant told me just this past weekend (3/23/03) that she is working on a new menu with even more vegetarian dishes. I highly recommend the broken rice dish. I loved the spring rolls. And I've heard the sandwich is awesome. Its a very tidy yet cozy place, and VERY cheap. It feels good to be there and tastes great. I highly recommend it!
mmm. the BIG bowl of soup is very delicious, especially with fried tofu. (they aren't kidding when they say BIG). and the mock duck sandwiches are also super yummy (vegans order it without butter). they make their own french bread for the sandwiches and it's like REAL french bread! it's light and crusty, but soft and not hard to bite into. It's vegan like all good french bread should be. Plus the people that work there are super nice.
Excellent vegetarian springrolls, quite different from most others you'll find in the cities. Though it's not apparent, they'll make vegetarian versions of just about everything on their menu with mock duck.
Great, inexpensive food. Quick service. Hard to find a table sometimes. Jasmine 26 is around the corner if you're looking for similar great food at a sit-down restaurant establishment. Easy to do take-out, friendly staff.