I’ve picked Formosa Street Food & Bar for my birthday more than once, which is probably the clearest review I can give it. Some restaurants are good for one plate and a quiet nod. Formosa is better when the table gets crowded.
This visit had a different excuse. Caila and I met her brother after he picked up his new motorcycle, and Formosa on NW 23rd felt like the right place to land. It sits in Oklahoma City’s Uptown 23rd District, right in the middle of a corridor that is changing fast with the ongoing streetscape work between Western and Broadway.


That construction has made 23rd Street feel a little torn up lately, because it is. Nearby businesses have had to adjust, including Big Truck Tacos temporarily closing so crews could move faster. But that also makes it a good time to remember why this stretch matters. Uptown 23rd still has the mix of local restaurants, music spots, bars, and odd little Oklahoma City energy that makes it worth navigating a cone or two.

Formosa fits that stretch well.
Order for the table, not just yourself
The best way to eat here is to stop thinking in entrées.
Formosa’s menu leans into Taiwanese and Chinese street-food-style plates, and the fun is in ordering several things, passing them around, and arguing politely over who gets the last bite. It ends up feeling more relaxed than everyone guarding their own plate, and in my experience, the cost lands about where a normal dinner would anyway. You just get more variety.

We started with edamame and the house meatballs, which are exactly the kind of openers that keep everyone reaching across the table. From there, we moved into basil chicken and crispy fried chicken, both easy crowd-pleasers without feeling like filler.

The weekly special was the one that grabbed the table: a black pepper chicken skewer served over noodles. The owner told us it had just been added to the permanent menu, and after eating it, that made sense. It had the kind of peppery, savory pull that makes you go back for one more bite even after you’ve already had enough food.

That is usually how Formosa gets me. I do not leave thinking about one single dish as much as the whole spread. Meatballs, chicken, noodles, something crisp, something saucy, a milk tea on the side. It adds up.

The milk tea was a good call with the meal, especially with the fried and peppery dishes. Formosa also has boba teas, Asian drinks, beer, wine, sake, soju, and cocktails, so it works whether you are doing dinner, a late-night bite, or a casual drink-and-snacks situation before or after something else on 23rd.

And then there are the buns.
The warm buns with sweetened condensed milk are simple in the way desserts should be simple when dinner has already done plenty of talking. Warm bread, sweet dip, no complicated speech needed. They have become one of my favorite ways to finish a meal there.
Why I keep going back
What I like most about Formosa is that it changes the pace of dinner.
Sharing plates makes everybody pay attention. Someone finds a favorite. Someone tries something they would not have ordered alone. Somebody asks what that sauce is. The table gets noisier in a good way.
That is why it works for birthdays, family dinners, meeting up after a motorcycle pickup, or bringing someone who says they want to try something different but does not want to feel lost in the menu. Formosa is approachable without being boring, and that is a harder line to walk than people think.
It is also useful. Formosa keeps later hours than a lot of OKC restaurants, especially Monday through Saturday, which makes it a strong Uptown 23rd option when dinner runs late or you are coming from Tower Theatre, The Blue Note, or another nearby stop.
I would not call it fancy, and that is not the point. The point is a table full of small plates, a drink in hand, and enough variety that everyone gets to claim a favorite.
For me, Formosa Street Food & Bar is one of Oklahoma City’s easiest recommendations when the goal is to actually share a meal, not just sit near each other while eating separate dinners.


Details
- Address: 427 NW 23rd St, Oklahoma City, OK 73103
- Phone: (405) 673-7338
- Hours: Monday-Saturday, 4:00 PM-11:45 PM; Sunday, 4:00 PM-9:45 PM
- Website: https://www.formosaokc.com/


