Seattle Day One

My parents and I decided to go on a road trip to mix things up a bit. We chose Seattle – which at a distance of about three hours away (plus or minus time waiting to cross the border) is a decent stretch for a road trip. This was our second trip down to Seattle – we went once last year – so we decided to stay a little east of the city centre in the neighbouring city of Bellevue. I really like Seattle. It’s the one American city I’ve been to that feels like a Canadian city. I don’t know how to explain that.
Anyway, after a three hour drive, we landed at the The Coast Hotel in Bellevue, just outside of Seattle. I thought Bellevue would be a good place for us to stay one night because my parents are big fans of surburbia and Bellevue definately has that feel. It’s downtown includes a Macy’s, a Nordstrom’s a giant Crate and Barrel as well as a couple of multiplex cinemas. After checking in, we decided to have lunch. The hotel clerk recommended a Japanese restaurant to us (Dad loves traditional Japanese food... I should have added that to the list of places he’s willing to go). The restaurant she recommended is called I Love Sushi and it’s tucked inside a dingy strip mall. It doesn’t look that stellar from the outside. But the place was packed with people. When we stepped inside, we saw on the left a sushi bar with three chefs slicing and dicing the seafood. Dad noted that they were actual Japanese sushi chefs. He gets suspicious when Chinese sushi chefs are behind the sushi counter. Dad likes his sushi authentic.
We were seated after waiting fifteen minutes. Dad flipped straight to the sashimi section of the menu. Mom, not being a terribly big fan of raw fish, started reading up on udon noodle soup. I also wanted something other than maki rolls and sashimi so I prowled the menu for other options. The I Love Sushi restaurant could also be called the I Love Tofu restaurant because it had quite a corner of the menu devoted to tofu. Tofu croquettes (deep fried tofu nuggets), tofu steak, tofu salad. I settled on a steamed tofu – which is silky smooth tofu steamed in a bowl. I ordered that with a side of cold soba noodles. Dad went for the bento box special and Mom decided to get a combo plate special of maki rolls and sashimi, under the promise from me and Dad that we’d eat the sashimi for her.
I would say the best part about the tofu is I got to play with my meal. The tofu itself comes in a high, porcelain bowl, covered with a little lid. Also with the tofu is a small jug of soy sauce. And another little bowl of green onion, pureed ginger and dried fish flakes. Those are the condiments for the oburi. It was fun to pour the soy sauce on and then mix in varying amounts of green onion, ginger and fish flakes with each bite. The tofu was very smooth and delicate – the texture was that like a lightly set custard. It didn’t have a very strong tofu taste. A lot of the flavour came from the condiments.The soba noodles were also fun to play with because I got to dunk the noodles in the accompanying sauce. Very interactive food. It was a nice change from maki rolls. Dad really seemed to like Mom’s sushi. I think he had more of her lunch than she did. And he was also a big fan of his bento box. I can’t remember what was in it. I was too busy interacting with my oburi tofu.
All in all, it was a good meal. The fish was fresh (or so Mom and Dad told me). The tempura was light and crisp (also according to the parents). And the service was good (my waitress quite patiently explained to me how to eat my oburi). The price was decent as well. I think our bill came to something lik e $45 US. I wouldn’t say the menu was particularly inspiring. (There was one maki roll called the caterpillar roll that was shaped like a green caterpillar – thanks to the liberal use of avacado slices – but that was about it.) But it was straight-up Japanese sushi well worth the price.