Tasso is a new high-end sandwich shop stationed in one of downtown Boise’s more intriguing locations: the skinny space that previously belonged to Fresh Off the Hook in Bodo. 

Tasso’s (seriously well-designed) website claims that everything the restaurant serves is made from scratch. If the supple yet crusty bread is made from scratch, color me impressed.

The menu: six $10 sandwiches, three $8 sandwiches, five side dishes.

I’ve tried three of the sandwiches and two of the sides. The eggplant sandwich—stacked with spicy hummus, cucumber, herbs, tomato, tahini sauce, and egg—was marvelously zany.

The chickpeas and flatbread sandwich—spiced tahini cabbage, gochu chickpeas, fennel pickles, and shrub sauce stuffed into a toasted flatbread—was light yet beefy.

The turkey sandwich (pictured above) was my favorite, largely because of the excellent choice of bread. The list of toppings is a whirlwind: citrus and herb sous vide, pickled fennel and carrots, cilantro, gochu cabbage, mayo, shrub sauce.

Tasso has distinguished itself from every other expensive sandwich in Boise with ambitious and unusual creations, but the side dishes concern me.

The Moroccan chicken and potato salads I tried were good but dressed in a rather monotonous aioli. The popcorn offered alongside every sandwich is dusted with so much seasoning that it threatens the respiratory system. The pickles are a problem, unleashing a burst of neutrally-flavored salt water when bitten into.

But the sandwiches, and the minimalist aesthetics of the restaurant, demonstrate real vision. I’ll happily give Tasso time to figure out the little things because I’m intrigued by what it might become. ∎