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| - Pholicious is a new Vietnamese restaurant located in the heart of SouthPark Mall. It occupies the area where Caribou Coffee used to be, right next to the central escalators. They pretty much focus on serving pho, though they also serve goi cuon (fresh shrimp roll) and fried rolls. They also become the first place in South Park to serve bubble tea (at least since Cali Juice left, but theirs sucked anyway). They offer your standard bowl of pho with your choice of meat, with combined meats at an additional cost. They provide bar seating, serve their pho in real dinnerware instead of disposable, and they bus the dishes when you're finished.
This is a concept that, while not new to more culturally diverse areas of the country, is fairly foreign to suburban Ohio. Pho inside a mall? I was curious but reluctant to try. Given what it is, I did not have high expectations, but they exceeded them by a mile and earned a fan. I had the "regular" size pho with beef and beef balls. It was small, but everything tasted fantastic. The broth was exceptional. The beef was served rare (as it should be), and the beef balls were just right. I thought they could have provided more bean sprouts and noodles. Besides that, it was a delicious bowl of pho. I would probably opt for the large size next time since the regular wasn't really filling. The honeydew bubble tea smoothie also passed the test. The boba wasn't perfect and there wasn't much of it in there, but overall, it was delicious and will definitely suffice if you want some bubble tea while shopping.
I definitely recommend this place to pho noobs and pho connaisseurs (phonnaisseurs?) alike. This is not your typical mall food. The pricing is competitive with other Vietnamese restaurants, so at $7-8 per meal, it might be more than what you'd pay at the food court, but you're getting a different product. While not quite on par with the more popular pho restaurants downtown, it's easily a step above the Asian eateries in the mall and is actually authentic. So if orange chicken just isn't cutting it, look no phurther than Pholicious phor your pho phix. Yeah, I just did that. I'll see myself out.
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