Nut POB Restaurant

Love this place! Nothing fancy — inside a small strip mall on the South Side of Des Moines, but the Lao/​Thai food is very good.
Have enjoyed the Pad Thai, Papaya Salad, Angry Beef and Catfish, and Phở. It is normally a stop when we visit Des Moines.
Customer Service is a little slow at times, but that shouldn’t distract you from an absolutely enjoyable food experience. Spicy, salty, tasty, and delicious are words I would use to describe this awesome food!

Tried Nut POB after a coworker recommended it and was not disappointed. I had the Shrimp Pad Thai and spring rolls — both were delicious. I thought the spice scale was comparable to other thai places in town, but the flavor was much better. I got my order to go, but the staff seemed friendly during the brief encounter. I will definitely be returning.

I’m not sure if they have new management here or if they had a big overhaul in their operations, but this place is pretty great now! Great food and good service, even the décor is updated! I still stray away from their Phở noodles because of the poor experience I had in the past.
Order their Lao or Thai food and you will not be disappointed! If you haven’t been back for a couple years I’d recommend you guys stop by again and give their food a try, remember, go for the Lao and Thai dishes!

I have been coming to nut pob for a few years now and I must say the only thing that keeps me coming back is the food. HORRIBLE customer service. The waitresses are all mainly high schoolers that don’t have manners. Most of the time I just order take out to avoid the reoccurring bad experiences I have had there. Best thing on the menu has definitely got to be their angry catfish (anything «angry» on the menu is delicious if you like spicy food!) I have ate angry catfish at numerous of restaurants and nothing compares to nut pob. Chicken wings, sticky rice and thum som is also delicious. Another dish is their cash chew chicken that I come back for. I would refer a lot of people to this restaurant if only their customer service was a lot better so I’m going to have to give this place 3 stars! Customer service is very important and should be highly practiced in today’s time.

My review stars are for the food and food only! The service here is known to be horrible and could easily garner a one star rating on some days, but I think they are trying to fix that. The service this last time was decent. The only bad thing was that they ran out of chicken wings and didn’t tell us until we were almost done with our meal even though we asked about it throughout the meal. Wings are an appetizer by the way.
The Food:
Crab Rangoon (⁵⁄₅)
Angry stir-​fry (any meat) (⁵⁄₅)
Angry Catfish (⁵⁄₅)
Papaya salad (³⁄₅)
Pad Se-​ew (⁴⁄₅)
Nuur Namtok (⁴⁄₅)
Everything that I listed was and always is awesomely tasty. Minus the papaya which is a hit or miss. My family members could easily order one catfish each and be content. My son likes the pad se-​ew noodles which are wide rice noodles stir-​fried in a sweet soy sauce with choice of protein and eggs and broccoli. The Crab Rangoons are easily the best anywhere and I’ve tried them all over the U.S. They make it right. Like I said their only downfall is the service but the owner is nice.
We have been coming here since they were a little tiny strip of a restaurant and will continue to do so for the food. It’s THAT good.

Really bad service. I come here every now and then, still, the service just keeps getting worse. The server helps one table at a time until they get their food then move onto the next table. It’s lunch time, I just want to get in and out. The food is always good and comes out quickly. I had to go grab my own pitcher of water to refill my own glass since the server doesn’t check up on my table. I saw a gentleman grabbing his own to go box. The kitchen staff were loud to the point where a customer on the phone had to speak up. I recommend ordering to go unless you have nothing to do but sit around from open to close, waiting on your server.

I was extremely worried to try this place out because of the reviews about bad service, but it pleasantly surprised me! We came in on a Saturday afternoon and there were only about 3 tables occupied, so the service was good.
We were seated at a table with a lazy Susan on it, which really benefited to the meal because we were able to easily share things. The portion sizes are big and made to share, so come hungry and ready to share!
The biggest highlight for me was the papaya salad. My family is Cambodian so we make papaya salad all the time, and this papaya salad lived up to the authentic thing. Great flavors in everything we ordered, the crab rangoons were full with cream cheese, which is always a great thing to see. (When people skimp out on the cream cheese in crab rangoons man…)
They have hot pot (Tom yum I think?) which I really want to try next time. Overall a decent place with good flavors and a good variety of thai food. Come when it’s not so busy and you’ll have a good time!

Well I want to start this off by saying my food was good! I had one of the few Veggie options on the menu. I had Red Curry with Vegetables! It was good, served super spicy in a giant bowl that made the portion look small, but it filled me up! Also served with family style rice for the two of us.
Now to the rest of the story… I don’t know if the place was understaffed for the night (we went on Friday night at 6pm) or the staff was just un attentive. But the service was really horrible.
The phone kept ringing, no one would answer, then it would go to a machine with a dial tone. This happened at least 6 times while eating. Loud enough for the entire restaurant to hear.
Numerous times people came in to pick up a to go order and had to wait over 5 minutes for someone to acknowledge there existence? All while there order sat there staring them down.
As for our service it was quite lacking as well. No one ever really came to check on us or ask how the food was. My wife also found what she thinks was a hair in her meal. Which was also a Red Curry with Vegetables, so my first thought is both of our meals were cooked together and their was a hair in her’s, probably was in mine too.
All in all very disappointing dining experience. The food was good, but the service was bad.
Also this would not be a good place to take a date, as it’s not romantic at all, and lit up like a grocery store.

I really want to give Nut Pob 5 stars. I really do. But I can’t. Let me tell you why.
The food is consistently very good. By consistently I mean over the course of the last 15+ years. I’ve had many things on the menu, and it’s a favorite of my friends in the Asian community. They describe it as authentic, and I simply know it as delicious. The pad Thai, the beef laap, the spring rolls — all are delicious. Oh, and try the chicken Penang.
But don’t expect fast service. Or friendly. I know some of the servers, and a few are great. But I’ve seen them harried and unhappy as it seems as though they’re understaffed at peak hours. The owner seems like a nice woman, but once when I was with a party of 8, the service was especially dismal. We asked repeatedly for water refills before getting them, we got the wrong orders at the table, and waited about an hour for the entrees to arrive. It wasn’t even that busy. At the conclusion of the meal, one of my friends asked to speak to the owner. She refused to come out to speak with us. I was embarrassed, as I’d raved to my out-​of-​town friends about this restaurant, and it seemed the owner wasn’t even interested in offering an apology.
I did not return for over a year. Eventually I thought I’d try take-​out and that worked out great. When not subjected to the service, the food is much more palatable.

Since moving to the south side I’ve been to nut pob twice. The first time I got lad na beef and it was amazing thick wide rice noodles in this delicious wonderful garlic gravy. I went today craving this same dish. I ordered the same thing, only to be very disappointed and let down. The sauce was much darker this time, and was absolutely awful. It was sweet yet had soo much salt and just tasted terrible and the beef was not even close to edible, it was chewy and disgusting. No server ever came around to ask how our food was. There were six tables and two servers. I work as a server and understand it can be difficult, but honestly they were awful. One didn’t even speak English I don’t think. So once it came time to check out the waitress asked how our food was and I told her my honest opinion and told her that I didn’t eat it and all she had to say was «I’m sorry I’ll let them know. We have two new chefs today.» There was no effort to try to keep my business, no offer of comping the dish or getting something new, so I will not be returning. Like I said I have worked at restaurants for quite a while and understand how to deal with a unhappy customer but they can’t grasp that apparently.
Bottom line, don’t waste your time here. You can literally go to any other restaurant and get a better experience.

Their papaya salad and angry catfish is soooo good! If you are in the area, this is a must go restaurant. One of my all time fav thai rest.

Thai, Lao, Vietnamese? Pretty much all of the above. I tended toward the Thai when I went, but if I would have went more Lao I’m sure the dinner would have been just as exceptional. Let me tell you something — when your waitress is Thai and Vietnamese, and she’s telling you about the owners and explaining dishes and talking to you about how her family makes the papaya salad you know you’re in the right place.
We ordered the lad na, spicy papaya salad and a curry with some rice. I like Thai spicy food and it was delivered as such. It’s a style that doesn’t have peanut or the long bean, but there are a thousand ways to make this salad. It’s amazing.
The lad na was served with noodles cooked to perfection. Sadly, it was served with American broccoli instead of a more Asian style of broccoli. Luckily, whoever cooked the broccoli did such an amazing job that I nearly ate all of it. Ask my wife, she’ll tell you that I rarely go after the veggies, and it’s not because I don’t like them, it’s that I prefer them to be cooked the right way. Go here and eat your broccoli, dammit. It’s cooked quickly in hot boiling water then immediately chilled in ice water and it’s cooked the right way. It’s crispy. I’m raving about the broccoli.
Go here and eat real food cooked the right way by people that know what the heck they are doing. It’s a rare find in Des Moines and I can’t wait to go back.

Good food. Has both Thai and Vietnamese, but definitely more on the Thai side. We love spicy food and ordered every accordingly. It was refreshing that, unlike some Thai restaurants, they didn’t water down the spice level for us Americans. Will definitely be going back.

Table of 4. Came here on Sat night. They seemed to be busy but not packed. Service was below average. The server had a difficult time refilling my drink. And was not around much.
The food was very good. It was somewhat spicy so if you don’t like it hot, get it with no spice.
The place was not fancy but clean and nicely decorated.
I’m giving 3 Stars because of the food and not the service.

This is in a SKETCHY neighborhood. Like, old tricked-​out minivans in the front blasting Gangsta music sketchy…
That being said, The inside is beautiful, spacious and clean. Our service was fine. The prices are SLIGHTLY higher/​comparable to other Chinese food places, and the entrée portions are slightly smaller…
Now, for the food:
Egg Rolls — good, nothing spectacular, and the menu says they have pork in it, but VERY LITTLE. Mostly cabbage. The dipping sauce that accompanies them is very sweet/​sour and yummy.
Crab Rangoons — now THAT’S what I’m talkin’ bout. They are big, stuffed with cream cheese and Krab with a ‘K’, haha. Fried perfection.
I ordered the Pad-​See-​Ew. This is very thick, wide, flat and soft noodles — and mine came with chicken and scrambled eggs. This is a very mild dish with a sweet undertone, not at all saucy. It was okay.
My brother ordered the Pad Piroth (ANGRY, which means spicy)!!! It is very spicy, but has a great flavor despite the heat. He asked for ‘no mushrooms’, but the cooks didn’t get the memo, because it was loaded with mushrooms. :(
The meal is served with standard fluffy rice.
Overall, was it worth the trip from Johnston? To try it, sure! Would I come back? Prolly not. But if I did, I would get 27 orders of Crab Rangoons…

Good food and nice service. Low key and nothing fancy, but the food is very well flavored. I really enjoy Nut POB. I recommend the Chicken Pad Thai.

I hardly write reviews but I was very upset with the customer service here. I used to come and eat here all the time but I don’t anymore due to their slow customer service. I ordered some food two days before my dad’s birthday and the girl that took my order told me it would be ready on Friday at 4:00. My mom and I came in to pick up the food and the girl up front had no idea what I was talking about. I didn’t want to argue about it because we were in a hurry since we were supposed to suprise my dad for his birthday. The owner came out and said there was no order and I told her I called and placed an order two days ago ahead of time. She told me she can get the food done in about 10 minutes but my mom was pretty upset so she wanted to leave. The owner then tried to find the piece of paper with the order on it and she finally did. Apparently the girl called in sick that day and didn’t tell anyone about the order. Overall, they didn’t seem very sorry and didn’t believe that I placed an order ahead of time. The girl up front seemed to be more sorry than the owner. I could’ve been a total b**** and told them they should have better employees that are responsible and keep their word but I didn’t want to come off as rude. I should’ve though because they’re the ones that didn’t «get» my order. All I can say is that we were lucky we didn’t order a lot of food and depended on them to provide the food for my dad’s party, otherwise we’d be screwed.

The food here is really good. I had the pad see ew and the papaya salad. Most restaurants make the papaya salad really spicy so I requested for it to be made mild. It was still spicy, but I think it was because of the pepper seeds that I might have eaten because, some bites were not as spicy. Despite the spiciness, the papaya salad was super addictive!
To my recollection, the dish of pad see ew is supposed to be covered in sauce. However, the pad see ew made here was more stir fried. It was still none the less delicious. I would definitely come back here for the food. The restaurant loses a star because of service. They were not super friendly here.

Outside: The exterior of the restaurant was very unassuming and plain as it is in a strip mall. There was an ornate wooden room divider in the window. They have free parking.
Inside: The seating and tables were standard and the art and cultural items appear very similar to those in many other Asian restaurants.
Menu: The menus each have a nice external touch of a swatch of cultural woven cloth. The selection included many items from both Thailand and Laos along with a few general Chinese food items such as Crab Rangoon. The prices seemed to be quite reasonable with an average cost below $ 10.
Staff: Our waitress met us at the door and accompanied us through our cultural meal. When asked she made recommendations that turned out great. She came back often to check out our meal, our drinks and our overall satisfaction. When we were done and just talking she quickly removed any empty plates.
Food: Everything appeared cooked fresh and arrived piping hot. From the appetizers to the main dishes, everything was great. We started with some Crab Rangoon which came out hot and served with the delicious sweet chili sauce that I love from Thailand. One big brand is «Mae Ploy» and it is like a sweet and sour sauce filled with dried pepper flakes and seeds which lends to a sweet and hot flavor mix that goes great with the Rangoon. The main dishes included Pad Thai, Oyster Beef and Angry Combination. The Pad Thai had a wonderful smokey flavor that was a great mix with the chicken and vegetables. The Oyster Beef was a bit like Mongolian Beef found at some Chinese places, but with a fresh, slightly sweeter flavor. Everyone loved this dish! The Angry Combination was a mix of beef, chicken and shrimp that along with the vegetables was doused in a wonderful hot sauce based on Thai chilis. On the first bite it was notably hot. After awhile the heat turned most to tears and the flavor seemed to wash out a bit in the heat. It seemed like this dish was better in small quantities or shared as it became too much of a good thing and the tongue only processed the chili over time.
Drinks: Several people in our group ventured out and tried the Thai tea which came with milk or cream in it. Those who loved it enjoyed the flavor. Those who didn’t like it found it to be either too «woody» or «tasting of sweet dirt.»
Overall: Everyone was very pleased with the food and service we experienced in the Nut Pob. From the sweet to the heat, the flavors were both known and new and a bit of Thailand became part of our world experience. Personally I’d say to avoid the tea unless you’re sure you already like it, enjoy the «Angry» items in moderation, have the Crab Rangoon and ignore the basic outside and come in for a great time with friends, dining in the friendly service and great food of Thailand.

Apparently, Nut Pob is known notoriously for their special Angry Catfish dish.
I’ve been here a handful of times, and when I first sampled the Angry Catfish off my friend’s plate, it tasted exceptional. Lip-​Smacking good! Just enough heat, and just enough tang. The fish was a good size and fried to perfection, while still maintaining a moist interior. The fish was absolutely delicious and I envied my friend — I restrained myself, when I really wanted to scarf down all of his delicious fish!!!
…I returned here the other night for a solo dinner so that I could have a plate of Angry Catfish to enjoy all my lonesome. Excitedly — Once the fish was served, I had taken off all the meat from the top-​side of the fish and put it over my plate of rice, drizzled the sauce over, took a heaping spoonful of the fish and sauce-​soaked rice… and my mouth was on FIRE. FIRE, I SAY!!! I should’ve (but didn’t) ask to give it back to the kitchen since I had already stripped an entire half off the fish. The waitress did not ask what level of heat I preferred and was given the HOTTEST. I seriously could not enjoy it. The heat was completely unbearable. The pain from the heat was magnified since I was eating alone and had to endure the scorching heat alone in silence since I couldn’t laugh it off or talk about the heat level as a person normally would if they were dining with companions. =(
Chicken Satay & Spring Roll… is served with sweet & sour sauce. Disappointment because these two are supposed to be served with a peanut sauce!!!
Service — it sucks. The restaurant waitresses are younger generations of family of the owners. Service is always inconsistent and impersonal. You order, you get your food, you pay. No follow up service in between.
The only thing I enjoy here, is the Beef Paenang. (Beef /​Coconut-​curry based sauce) and their Thai Iced Tea.
If you do decide to go here and want to order any food remotely hinting at heat, just remember to tell them how spicy you prefer things or your mouth will be on fire!!!