Ivy’s Deli

The spaces previously occupied by Ivy’s Deli and Sandella’s is being renovated and will open back up as a Chipotle… just saying…

Mr Howard made the damn best chili oil I ever had. I miss it. I bought it in large quantities. If anyone knows how to get a hold of Howard, please let me know! I will still be a loyal customer of the chili oil!
Referral fee to whomever knows his contact info!
Google me for contact info: Lamar Romero

This is the real deal. The owners are friendly. The service is slower but its relaxing atmosphere. Small place and few table but the food made up for it. Taste are exactly what I remembered from my Asia travels.

The wife and I came here for bubble tea one afternoon because the craving hit us, and Coco’s was just a bit too far of a drive for us that day. We should’ve made the drive to Coco’s.
I got the Thai Bubble Tea, my wife got the regular milk bubble tea. Both teas were so sickeningly sweet we could barely drink them. I enjoy a good Thai bubble tea with that nice, smokey thai tea flavor… this tasted like it was just liquified sugar dyed orange. My wife’s tea tasted the same. The boba pearls were so tough and chewy I almost choked on a few of them. Didn’t even try the food but after the bubble tea experience I don’t think we will.
**Updated 6/​17/​14**
Actually yes, we NEVER will try the food, because Ivy’s Deli shut down within the past few months. What a shame.

We came here after my friend’s son’s soccer game. They had a print out of a review on their fridge with a mouthwatering picture of dumplings on it, and I asked if they had ever been to Ivy’s. They said no, it was not in their area, but we would be nearby for the soccer game and we could go.
The dumplings lived up to the review’s write-​up and picture. My friend had lived in China for 13 years, so she new her dumplings. She loved them — said they were the best ones she had eaten since moving to Texas about 3 years prior. Her son 14 year old son agreed. So delicious! We loved our noodle dish too — we ordered lots of food for the 4 of us, and nothing was left at the end of the meal. We shared two smoothies also and they were outstanding, in particular the mango. The only reason this is not a 5 star is the price — it was pricier than most.
We met the owners — Howard and Ivy — who were from Hong Kong. Howard is front of the house and extremely personable, recommending several dishes he thought we would enjoy (and did). Very charismatic and chatty. He told us that his wife, Ivy, was the chef, and that she was the reason the food was so delicious. He asked her to come out and meet us when we praised her food. Darling couple.
Baffled by the 1 star reviews — definitely worth a visit in my book!

This place is a total rip off and the food looks like microwaved leftovers.

This place was awesome! If they make a suggestion for what to try, take them up on it. I wouldn’t have tried some items on my own but am glad I did.

Tiny restaurant in strip mall, near IKEA. Super friendly couple. Excellent dim sum, and great smoothies

Good food and EXCELLENT service! They apparently made some things there because it wasn’t the fastest, but definitely fresh and yummy. We will be back.

came for Dim Sum on a Saturday afternoon. The food was either super salty or had No flavor at all. The staff was very friendly but I won’t be back.

All that walking inside IKEA made us hungry and we were in the mood for some Chinese food. According to Unilocal,Ivy’s Deli was nearby so we figured why not. Two words to sum up this place: HUGE disappointment.
Skimming the menu, you can’t help but be a bit overwhelmed with the vast selection. Our waiter gave us a pencil to check-​off/​quantify what we want on the list and to turn it in whenever we’re ready. As we were still making up our minds, the owner comes over to assist us. He was helpful, but was yelling at my mom like she was either hard of hearing or didn’t understand any English. Very annoying. We ordered several small plates to sample, and everything we ate was horrible.
/​/​California roll: Yuck. Way too much rice and it was very bland.
/​/​Chicken fried rice: Yuck. Had a rancid aftertaste.
/​/​Mini pork bun: meh
/​/​Pot sticker: meh
/​/​Almond bubble tea: Yuck. Tasted weird and had a chemical/​artificial aftertaste. Boba was mushy and way too soft.
We couldn’t leave fast enough because we were starving and didn’t want to eat this crap any longer. Paying at the register, I noticed that the kitchen area was in a disarray and looked unclean. This food is way too expensive for what it’s worth and we definitely will not go back. (One reviewer was right about smelling like oil when you leave. Our clothes had a rancid scent that lingered all day)

This place is really bad, the pictures on the menu make it seem as delicious and savory the end result is some really bad reheated frozen Asian food. Not the best in this case go to your local freezer isle for better food for a quarter of the price

Meh sums it up nicely. The food was mediocre (salty, greasy, bland, our dishes covered the spectrum) — after looking at the massive menu I should’ve had a clue. It seems like this place offers a ton of so-​so food instead of focusing on fewer dishes prepared well. We ordered several small plates so that we could sample a variety, and no one cared much for any of it.
It was very warm inside. The seating is not comfortable (like ice cream shop chairs and tables), and the aroma of the place is very strong and not pleasant.
I’m a bubble tea addict, and Ivy’s Deli uses the powder, like most other places. It was suggested that we order the juice (the owner later said I ordered the smoothie, I honestly was unclear about what the difference was since he was unclear), as that drink contains fresh fruit. It turns out that the smoothie is basically ice and fruit, and when you add in the tapioca balls, cost $ 5.30. That’s steep.
The staff is very friendly.
I love bubble tea, but we will not be going back.

I don’t know how this place has 4 stars. The food was greasy and salty. We ordered shu mai, mini pork buns, shrimp rolls and chicken crispy noodles. The shu mai was sweet, mini pork buns was bland and luke warm, shrimp rolls were covered in sesame seeds and the crispy noodles were salty and also covered in sesame seeds. What’s the deal with sesame seeds? Thats all you can taste.
The smell is not appealing when you walk in. There are only 4 tables inside and very warm. It felt nicer outside. When we left, our clothes smelled like greasy oil.

My new favorite Asian place in the greater Round Rock/​Cedar Park area.
I had been wanting to try this place since it opened and today for lunch I was able to convince the wife that we should give it a shot. My wife insisted on eating outside since the inside was filled with the strong aroma’s from the kitchen, and the seating was somewhat limited.
The menu is extensive… we are talking Cheesecake Factory extensive. We used a «shotgun» approach to ordering and sampled lunch specials, sushi, dim sum, tea, seafood, and soup. Some of the items were merely decent, and some were downright awesome. I think this is why the previous reviews of this place are all over the map. Your experience and impression of this place will vary greatly depending on what you order. They might do better if they cut the sushi altogether and were not so ambitious with the variety. It is better to do a few things really well, then to offer a wide selection at the expense of delivering consistent quality.
The best items we had were the seafood fried rice and the pork and veggie stuffed bun roll. I have never wolfed down fried rice so fast in my life. Our 18 month old really liked the fried sweet potato rolls.
You cannot deny that the owner «Mr Howard» is working his butt off to make this place work. He was literally sprinting back and forth from the kitchen delivering food to the customers. He has a charming and friendly personality which makes it hard not to like him instantly. Mr Howard is a native of Hong Kong, and says that his best dishes are Cantonese in origin.
The limited indoor seating will definitely be a problem in hot weather, but I have a feeling I will regularly be ordering take out from here. I have a couple recommendations if you choose to give this place a try:
1. Try a bunch of things… you are bound to find something you like.
2. When Mr Howard labels something as hot, he means it… the hot and sour soup was so spicy I almost spit it out at first just from surprise. Once I got used to it, it was actually pretty good though.

Authentic Pan-​Asian menu at a price! In the IKEA shopping center at 35/​University in Round Rock is a little mom/​pop restaurant with a surprising broad menu of Chinese, Japanese and Korean dishes. I came across Ivy’s while desperately searching for dim sum in Austin. There are fewer than 5 dim sum places in town, and not all up to snuff!
So Ivy’s is a mom/​pop restaurant with the simple décor one would expect on Lamar. They are open late until 1030 which is great for late night post-​movie, post– shopping diners. The friendly owner/​server welcomed us to a small group of tables at the back of the restaurant. The layout of the restaurant is such that the kitchen is open and exposed, so we could see the one woman/​chef/​cook hard at work.
The menu is a delight — heavy emphasis on seafood — frog leg dishes, lobster, eel. There’s also a good sized sushi menu as well as a dim sum menu. They even have Peking duck and Asian desserts like mochi and bubble tea.
The owner said he was from Hong Kong, while the cook said she had trained in Beijing, so we were really eager for authentic food.
The problem is that there are no prices on the menu — it’s a laminated photo-​menu. But based on other Unilocal reviews, we ordered the Chef’s ribs (6 pieces), sui mai (4 pieces), monster roll sushi, bok choy, and a combination fried rice. 5 dishes in total.
The ribs were very good, though the portion seemed small. It was more like an appetizer sized dish. Bok Choy was heavenly — steamed with peanut oil and peanut garnishing. fried rice was fresh and hearty. There was a mistake with the sushi roll, and the server promptly replaced it.
The sui mai was very fresh but not like a sui mai from a dedicated dim sum restaurant. In a dim sum restaurant, sui mai is an open faced dumpling with pork, shitake mushrooms, water chestnuts, topped with crab or salmon roe and mushroom, wrapped with an egg pasta. Ivy’s was a plain dumpling that was wonderfully fresh but missing all the other ingredients.
Overall, the food was wonderful, very-​very fresh — we could watch our meal being cooked before us, and the service was attentive and friendly.
The big surprise was the bill — these 5 dishes totalled $ 60 before tip. The most comparable restaurant would be Golden Wok — a pan-​asian restaurant at 35/​Parmer where the same combo of dishes would be little more than half the price with larger portions. I’ll take the blame for the bill — one should never order from a menu that doesn’t have prices without being ready for a surprise.
Given the exotic menu, I would definitely return — the grilled eel on the menu looks great — but I would want to see the prices spelled out clearly.
Expect a follow-​up review soon!

I’ve since visited Ivy’s Deli a couple of times since my maiden voyage. And I have to say that something has just «fallen off» if you catch my drift. The «smoothies» are not smooth at all. As a matter of fact, I ordered a mango juice and it tasted like flavored water. At $ 3.50 a pop, that flat out pisses me off. My husband’s smoothies also taste like juice with tiny ice crystals. Any time you try to order a bubble tea, they try to upsale you to the «no powder» drinks that taste sooo much better. I can’t tell what is so much better except the extra buck. The food is still ok, but it wasn’t as good as the first time we visited. Somehow it tastes saltier and I’m beginning to get disenchanted with this place.
My husband made the mistake of not letting the owner pack our leftovers one time… ONE TIME! And now, our service is always lacking, it’s almost as if the owner was personally offended and now the tension hangs in the air. Even so, the custard buns and the ribs are still worth going for. I’ll let him pack my box for me as long as the drinks/​service improve.

What is not to love about authentic, fresh Chinese food served to you by the owner of a local establishment? Nothing, ok, maybe something but we will get to that later. The service, parking, seating, environment was all great. The food was perfect and plentiful. We ordered several items off the menu (Sticky Rice, Seasonal Greens w/​Oyster Sauce, Spicy & Hot Chicken, Steamed Coconut Dim Sum) all of it was fresh and tasty. The Coconut Dim Sum was literally melt in your mouth delicious, I actually think I am salivating as I am typing about these tasty, creamy treats. The owner waited on us while his wife cooked our meal. This was a real mom and pop Chinese style restaurant.
Ivy’s Deli is a little gem surrounded by the usual suspects of chain restaurants and eateries in the Ikea shopping area. The «something» I made note of in the beginning of this review is their location. It is a bit out of the way for most folks. This means I am really going to have to be craven some mad Chinese food to go all the way out there to get it. You also may not notice it given the fact that it is squeezed between some high profile well know eateries. I literally walk by in a low blood sugar haze on my way to another restraint when my mini me stopped me and said we should give Ivy’s a try. If you live in the area no problem. I your out there shopping and want authentic, fresh Chinese this is your place.

Nice cute little shop to get smoothies, milk tea, and munchies. Servers were friendly and took their time so if you’re in a rush, plan accordingly.
What we swallowed:
MANGO SMOOTHIE: Fresh and flavorful with nice mango bits in it.
GRAPEFRUIT SMOOTHIE: Tart and refreshing.
TARO BUBBLE TEA: Ok but tasted a bit fake.
SESAME BALLS: These were nice and crispy but small: bite size.

had a early dinner with the BF here on a Saturday after one of those marathon IKEA trips. We decided against the Swedish meatballs, so i checked my Unilocal!app and figured out that Ivy’s was in the same shopping center. Sounds good.
We had the Dim Sum. We ordered the pork steamed dumplings, the steamed BBQ buns and the skewers of BBQ pork. I enjoyed the dumplings and they had good flavor. The BBQ buns were ick. I took one bite and that was it. The BF ate them and thought they were ok. The skewers… well, ummm.
The Owner (i assume) was a great host and very nice and full of helpful suggestions. He also talked me into a fresh fruit smoothie with bubbles*. (We’ll talk about that later.) He brought out each dish as they were ready. The dumplings first, then soon after the buns. Then, we sat there. I was pretty sure he forgot that we had ordered it. But, finally, out he comes with a basked of meat. First, it looked Nothing like the picture on the menu. Second, it wasn’t on a skewer. Third, i tasted EXACTLY like reconstituted beef jerky. Seriously, imagine beef jerky brought back to it’s unjerkeyed state & grilled. It wasn’t bad. It was ok. But, where is the BBQ flavor and were are the skewers and why is it prepared in a completely different way than the menu explained. I honestly wonder if we were given the wrong item. Whateves.
All in all, it was decent. I would give it another try and eat some different items. The menu is huge and they have sushi too. Tho, i would probably just stick to the Dim Sum. We paid $ 22 bucks for the meal. meh.
Oh. and i found out that i DO NOT like «bubble”/tapioca drinks. /​shrug.