Cafe 88

The Wonderful Chicken Bento Box and Hot and Sour Soup were really good. Lightyears better than the offerings of your typical American Chinese restaurant. Color me impressed.

Best chicken poppers I’ve ever had in my life. (Though called crispy chicken here). Not too bready, nice herbs and flavor. Also the beef noodles are legit.

3 stars because its sub-​par comparing to all chinese restaurants that I’ve ever tried in the world through out my travels. But 4 stars because the lady is so nice and she tries very hard to make it feel like home cook. Would I come back and eat there again? If I’m in the area yes. But

Different place
Owner and one assistant cook usually
Paper plates plastic forks
Homemade dishes — no frozen American Chinese crap
Great sweet and sour soup
Great spinach shrimp dumplings
Bento boxes are good
Great that you pay at counter and they walk it to your table — no tip needed — you are eating good food not going to be «waited on»
Pork chop and dumplings are like you would have visiting home of Chinese friends cooking for guests
May be too plain for American palette expecting grease and salt and brown sauces and gooey sweet stuff like you’d see on a buffet.
Only reason not a five is because I don’t like paper products. I know it reduces costs but I’d rather pay an extra buck per dish
If she goes to decent dishes that are durable (not made in China plastic wear either that isn’t safe) and does dish washing, I’d eat there twice a week for lunch and it gets 5 stars for value

5 stars, because this is the only real Chinese I’ve had in Charlottesville. And it’s pretty good
Beef noodle soup -$ 10.50 or something. Was good, hot soup with fettucine noodles. A little expensive, would skip this next time
Dan Dan noodles — the more I ate the more I liked. More soupy than I like dandan (and less oily), but good noodles
Amazing chicken (or whichever was dark meat) — very good and awesome bento box. I wanted to order a bento box of just the eggplant it was so good. The other vegetables were also delicious
Minimum credit card of $ 10 but easy to do. Small restaurant with limited seating. Will be back

Don’t know what the hype is about. A small crappy little café with average food and ZERO service. Because the kitchen door was open so I got to see my fried chive dumplings came directly out of the microwave oven. And I cannot deal with the fact that they use cheap disposable tableware. Even Mel’s Café blocks away can serve me with normal tableware for a cheaper food price I pay. No need to mention the service because there is nothing like it at all. My past experience with Taiwanese restaurant was always good, nice services and delicious food. Café 88 is the only exception in my dining history.

Heavenly pie is really delicious. Very simple homemade pie with egg, chives, mushroom and a bit of garlic. A must get finger food if you happened to be in the area.

In what appears to be a place with a dearth of good Chinese places, Café 88 certainly fills the void. My girlfriend and I started with an order of scallion pancakes, which were crispy and piping hot. For dinner, I got the beef noodle soup special. The noodles are wide and tend to splash around a bit, but are cooked to perfection. The beef is the star of the dish though, as it is very tender and plentiful. The beef fat provides wonderful flavor to the broth, which is spicy, but not so much that you breathe fire. I slurped every last drop out of the bowl (apart from the drops which found their way onto my shirt).
My girlfriend had the Amazing Chicken and enjoyed it very much. She tried ordering a side of sesame noodles, but we were told that they were all out. Regardless, Café 88 is my go-​to Chinese restaurant in town.

Update to the beef noodle soup. It is loaded with tender moist beef chunks and the noodles are al’dente simply an amazing bowl of goodness. It’s so good that I am having this in July /​August.

Small out of the way place with yummy food. We made a quick stop while travelling by Charlottesville based on Unilocal reviews and it was up to expectations, thanks Unilocalers:). Food served in to go containers. And when we went not really prepared to «serve» because our dishes all came out at different times. Not a big deal but manage your expectations if in a rush or they are busy. All of the menu was in Chinese first, and the only diners were Asian, both of which I take as very good signs.
The food was tasty, and decent proportions. I need to learn how they do their eggplant! The «vegetarian protein» in ginger sauce was interesting and tasty but not wonderful. I have had other «mock (animal name here)» dishes before and I’ve never really thought them very good always only ok. I will order off the daily «Home» menu on the wall next time. The other diners looked like they ordered better. My kids loved the shredded pork, and the spicy pork chop went over over well too. We will have to make sure next time we try the house specialties. Even the items we ordered were a step up in freshness and flavor from your basic Chinese-​American restaurant though. I enjoyed it enough to see what they can do on their authentic dishes on another visit.
Also, there’s kind of like a strict mama in the kitchen which is actually ok for my sometimes rowdy kids to get a firm word from others! I have to agree with some other reviews about service, its almost a one woman show so understand what you’re in for as the proprietor takes orders, cooks, serves, busses, and cashiers.
I’d give it 3.5 stars.

I had the Amazing Chicken. It was alright and a good value. I liked that you get vegetables with the dish. I would’ve preferred more chicken in the meal and an option for fried rice. I would go back and try something else.

Café 88 is my favorite Chinese food place in my two years at C’ville. I cannot talk enough about how I enjoyed every dish there and their beef noodle is the reason that I long for Friday and Saturday coz it’s the time of the week they serve it! I haven’t had the same quality of Taiwanese beef noodle even after I moved to San Francisco Bay Area and just think there are way more Chinese food selections here than C’ville. Thank you café 88 for treating my homesick stomach and waking up my Saturday mornings in those old days. You will be one of the biggest reasons that I revisit C’ville. And I hope you are still there!
Eric from Darden.

Before visiting the Three Notch’d Brewery, we wanted to fill up on food across the street. We saw that Café 88 had a nearly perfect score on Unilocal and decided to give it a try. We weren’t disappointed.
I ordered the Wonderful Chicken bento box, my wife the Amazing Chicken (2 stars for name creativity). They came with rice and two seasonal vegetable sides for just under $ 9.
As you can see in my picture, they obviously take care to have a colorful presentation. The purple vegetable was some kind of root, the green was bok choy I think. The chicken was moist with a tasty crunchy outside.
Overall, a great place. Wish we lived in C’ville and could be regulars!
(As an aside, they also had really great smelling mint hand soap in the bathrooms. Kind of random, but very pleasing)

FINALLY made it here for the beef noodle soup and IT DID NOT DISAPPOINT. I found the beef noodle soup at Gingko’s a little too spicy for my taste, but this had just the right amount of kick. The beef broth tastes fresh, authentic and so mouthwateringly delicious. There’s a reason why this place was still half full at 4pm on Saturday with people eating her beef noodle soup! On another note, the wonderful chicken bento box is my go to meal here and it’s always the perfect lunch/​dinner option when you’re craving asian food.

I had high hopes based on the reviews, but I was not impressed. The food was pretty tasty but everything was very greasy. I usually don’t mind hole-​in-​the-​wall restaurants, but I was dismayed to see disposable plates and flatware. I’m going to have to keep looking for a good Chinese place in town.

It was really good! Had the taiwanese pork and amazing chicken bento box, it was definitely a good amount of food for $ 7.88. Also had the shrimp shao mai and the shrimp and chive dumplings, came out hot and fried, and yummy, but nothing like taste-​buddingly extraordinary. Lady at the counter was super friendly. I hope to come back and try their crystal shrimp dumplings, because they had ran out.

Taiwanese! This place is wonderful! The style of the interior is casual and immediately gives you that cute, simple Taiwanese café vibe. The menu is short and sweet, which I often take as a sign that the few things made are potentially excellent. There were 2 of us, and since we were there on a Saturday, we seized the chance to try the famed beef noodle soup. It did not disappoint! High quality beef, excellent broth, just the slightest hint of spiciness. The only thing I would change would be the noodles — it would be great if they were housemade, but I was happy that at least they were wide.
We also ordered the fried tofu with salt and basil, and the scallion pancake. Those were good though not particularly special. I thought the pancake was a little on the oily side. When we went they were not serving boba or cold sesame noodles but I will definitely be back to try those, and other things on the house specialty list. So happy to have found yummy and authentic Chinese food in the area!

My goodness gracious!
Good taiwanese food! Solid boba! Scallion pancakes! Inexplicable bento-​boxes! Look. C’ville’s got some problems, but a lack of Taiwanese food is not among them.

Café 88 may look like every other Asian take out restaurant but oh man! it’s leaps and bounds better than any of the other greasy chinese food places we all shamefully crave. I was a bit skeptical at first because some of the previous reviews stated that the beef noodle soup was overhyped. I respectfully disagree. My noodle soup was AMAZING. The owner definitely did not skimp on the portion size and the amount of beef that topped off the bowl of noodles. I also got the crispy chicken which quickly became addicting.
The best part of Café 88 however is the owner. She’s so sweet and so passionate about the authenticity of her food. If I didn’t live an hour away… I would be here all the time.

The beef noodle soup that you’ve been hearing so much about? It’s not good. It’s really not. The noodles aren’t fresh, the beef is dry, and the flavor of the broth isn’t any good.
Café 88 is a tiny little place that has two people working: one cashier/​waitress and one chef. We tried to order the Chinese scallion pancakes, but the cashier said they didn’t have time to make it.
I wouldn’t listen to the hype, but the options for any sort of Asian food are super limited here in Charlottesville, so if you really have a craving, I guess this is your place.