Pike Place Chowder

Even though my family goes on semi-annual road trips to America, we never really find the effort to go try new food. We've developed this one-meal-a-day schedule making it rather difficult to convince everyone to try a new restaurant when all cravings are for Sweet Tomatoes (which is one of my favourite restaurants ever, but still.) So finally, after pestering my father year after year, he finally promised to drive through downtown Seattle so we could have some clam chowder. The good stuff.

Pike Place Chowder @ Pike Place Market

Parking at Pike Place Market isn't free, but thankfully it isn't outrageous. Between 0 and 1 hour is $3 and between 1 and 2 hours is $6. Payment is made via a machine by the elevator on the Main floor. My tip is to keep your eye on the time and set aside at least 15 minutes to get back to the garage to avoid missing your desired time deadline. I believe it is only around $8 for all day parking if you enter before 9am.

Pike Place Chowder @ Pike Place Market

So finally, we are at Pike Place! Surprisingly, even on a Monday, there were so. many. people. everywhere. I understand that it's a tourist area but even when I visited in the summer, there weren't that many people bustling about. As a reference, the line up for the original Starbucks was out the door and down to the corner of the street. It was insane.  

Looking at the Post Alley sign on Pine Street

The famed Pike Place Chowder is located on a street called 'Post Alley'. It isn't accessible by car and there is only a street sign at one end. Just so happens we completely missed that end and made a gigantic circle around the block just to find it was a 200 metre walk from where the parking elevator was. It really is an alley that is a back lane turned business area. 

The fastest way to get to Pike Place Chowder is to walk from the tulip shop (under the giant Public Market sign on top of the roof outside) down Pine Street about 100 metres. The entrance to Post Alley is directly across the street from Sur La Table, a home good store. 

Pike Place Chowder Menu

We arrived just before noon, and juuuuust before the mad lunch rush of both tourists and office workers. The line up was just barely around the corner when we got there and the wait wasn't too long. There is one employee ladling the soup and another one ringing up the cashier, making the line of hungry customers chug along smoothly. Both employees were very patient and generous with us indecisive first-timers, even if their stiff facial expressions look otherwise. At first, we were going to order four large bowls of soup but then we saw a quart size of soup available (which is equivalent to two larges). He already poured soup into one of the large bowls but simply dumped it out and scooped us a quart size. Even though the menu board is already full of writing, I think they need to indicate the price of the quart to let customers know that it is an option.

A quart (32 oz) of Clam Chowder ($13.95), large (16 oz) Seafood Bisque and Market Chowder ($8.45 each)

After all the lengthy talk about everything other than food, it's time to talk about the soup!

Mizuki Buffet

Needing to fill our tummies before jumping on an evening flight to Los Angeles, my family went out in search of a buffet. My dad discovered Mizuki on the internet and the reviews were okay so we took a risk (Asian buffets, you know?) and gave it a try. In short, it wasn't a bad idea!

Seating inside Mizuki Buffet

Once we entered the restaurant, we were surprised at how many people were having lunch on a Monday afternoon. We noticed that there were especially a lot of Asian customers, most of which were Korean or Mandarin speaking. There wasn't much of a wait, just a minute or two for a waitress to escort us to a table. There are a lot of tables in the restaurant, so it can fit a lot of people. However the noise level can get loud because there isn't much insulation in the ceiling to reduce the noise (ew, physics...) 

My sushi plate vs. dad's sushi plate

In many reviews, people seem to think the sushi is the best part of the buffet. I kind of disagree though. Yes there are at least five chefs constantly making sushi but I didn't really like the sushi. I'm pretty sure they don't use real fish roe. Neon green 'fish roe' is rather sketchy to me. The sashimi is mushy and flavourless. 

Here is my thoughts on what I ate:

Din Tai Fung 鼎泰豐 - Bun time!