Part of Downtown Bellevue that's not the Mall...

Today I decided to drive down to Downtown Bellevue, park, and go exploring. I parked at Bell Square because it's free and headed out in a northerly direction. There are a few little strip malls up in that area, and strip malls to me generally mean good, hidden gem restaurants.

There happens to be one restaurant in one of these strip malls that I've already been to, so I already know it's delicious. I walked by there today and peaked in the window and thought longingly of their food. The restaurant I am talking about is call Facing East. It's a Taiwanese restaurant and it would be hard to find if you didn't know it was there.

I went there with my parents about a month ago. They have a fairly small menu, but I'm pretty sure everything on it is amazing and totally different than any other food I've had. Their most well known dish is the "Pork Burger" which is marinated pork belly on a soft dumpling-like roll. With the pork belly are some pickled veggies, cilantro and crushed peanuts with sugar. It is an amazing combination, and it made me forget that I don't generally like fatty meats like pork belly.

They also have a wide range of noodle and rice dishes. My dad had a spice rubbed pork chop that was phenomenal, it had cinnamon, salt, sugar and chili on it in a kind of dry rub, very delicious, very different. We got a couple of dishes that were braised greens and garlic, the food was big on garlic! The braised greens with garlic and bacon definitely stand out in my mind, we didn't want those to end. I had a bowl of noodles called Horfun, they were much like Chow fun and I am assuming this is just a regional difference in name. Pretty much, to sum it all up, everything we ate was fantastic and I am planning a trip back very soon. You should all go check it out too! Their location is Bellevue Way and 10th right next to "The Studio", which is a kids art studio.

After drooling a bit at the doorstep of Facing East I continued on up the street and then decided to head East. I found a lot of restaurants and salons spread throughout the ground floors of all the new condo buildings, and there is so much construction there's potential for many more businesses. It will be interesting to see what's there in a couple years.

I happened upon the Doll Museum, which I knew about, but didn't know where it was, I'm going to have to go there some time when someone comes to visit that would want to go with me.

I walked by a couple places I am eager to try out, one is the new Danube Bistro. I believe it is a Czech restaurant, and I am very curious what that cuisine is like. The other place I will definitely go back to is Belvi, a coffee and tea shop. I read recently that they are in dispute with Starbucks because they would like to expand and Starbucks has some kind of deal set up where they get to be everywhere (apparently) and won't let other coffee shops come in. Well, Belvi was closed when I walked by, but I peaked in their window and it looks cozy, like a perfect coffee shop. It looked like they had some interesting teas and chocolates too, which is good, because I don't actually like coffee.

I checked out a few more new spots but the best part of my walk were the few little interesting vignettes I happened upon. Since I was out during the Seahawks playoff game there were hardly any other people out, and most of the businesses were closed, or probably should have been.

I walked by the window of a very swanky new restaurant and looked inside, and there was a waitress in uniform, sleeping on one of the booths, and who could blame her, it was a sleepy afternoon and no one was around.

I walked by a retirement/assisted living complex and looked in their windows, in one a very kind looking elderly woman, with an even older woman who appeared to be her mother, gave me a huge grin as she helped her mother put her coat on. In the next room, the dining room, a young Muslim woman with a head scarf was looking bored, head bent down, completely wrapped up in something she was reading, the dining room was empty and she must have been between shifts.

These little human scenes always catch my attention and I tend to enter into them like little stories and think about what the people in them are doing, who they are, what are their lives like, that kind of thing. These little scenes just make a common walk on a grey, quiet January Saturday more worthwhile.