Cilantro Vietnamese Bistro - Cincinnati

I am actually in love with Cilantro. The pho here is so so good and something I crave on a regular basis. The restaurant is right off UC's campus and only has street parking, but Cilantro delivers via DoorDash and UberEats and is always packaged up so nicely! I can only speak to the pho because that's the only thing I order. When you order soup here you choose your broth style: pho, sate, hu tieu, or vegan. Then you choose your protein: chicken, pork, beef meatballs, sliced beef, shrimp, tofu, or veggie. And last you pick your noodle: vermicelli, rice noodle, egg noodle, mung bean. My go-to is pho with chicken and veggies (extra $1.50) with rice noodles. Whenever you order pho you are also presented with a plate filled with bean sprouts and fresh herbs (cilantro, mint, scallions), jalapeños, limes, hoisin and chili paste to add to your soup. The chicken is all white meat and plentiful and the veggies included are broccoli, cauliflower, carrot, and onions. The soup portions are large and at $9 it's truly a price that cannot be beat! And the quality is seriously so good! The service is always fast and exceedingly friendly. Whenever I'm craving a hearty bowl of quality soup, Cilantro always delivers.

On a cold day there is nothing better than a hot soup. For $9 you get an entire soup tureen full of Pho. You know the usual fear: that the Pho will be all broth and no beef. Well, Cilantro does it right. I got a huge helping of thinly sliced steak. I got to thinking: I couldn't even make this at home for $9. Steak is expensive! The restaurant closed for a bit this year (luckily for the Clifton community it has reopened). I was seriously hoping they had the chance to renovate the interior. While it is in a cool building on the central business strip of McMillan, the inside is dated and feels a little on the dirty side. I wish they could pull off an OTR-esque historic building renovation, but when they only charge $9 for a huge Pho I don't see how they'd be able to afford it.

About a year and a half ago this was my absolute favorite place. I'd come here to grab my weekly pho and invite anyone to come along and have a chance to indulge with me. Over time I realized the quality dwindled and eventually my heart broke when this restaurant closed. When I heard it was reopening, I was overjoyed; however, I'm disappointed. The quality is still subpar. The pho broth was fatty, leaving an oily mouth feel after each bite. The pho beef was tough and the broth was not as flavorful as I remember. The noodles were cooked perfectly though and I loved the amount of green onions in the broth. The new look of the restaurant is cool and I like how we are able to now order upfront when we first walk in. I hope with time, the quality and flavor of the pho will improve.

The chefs/cooks do not understand the concept of portion control . I wrote this in my last review. I am glad they are still a gaggle of mad mad men. The pho was just as delicious and filling as I can remember and my waitress was very nice Amazing food. And so I had 2 glasses of Tempranillo. Sue me. Yep. Still 5 stars.

Ordered the beef pho to go and the broth had a weird smell coming off it to begin with. The basil that came with the orders was not good. I had to pick out some of the parts that had gone bad. Definitely not like your mom used to make. But what's a desperate sick kid away from home supposed to do?? Also, I reheated the soup/meat that I couldnt finish from the first time and it turned an odd pink color...