Bowl Gogi — Restaurant in Bellevue

Rating: 4.0/5.0

Bowl Gogi is located right next to Bellevue Transit Center and is only open on weekdays between 10:45am and 3:30pm (very limited hours, in my opinion). After passing by this restaurant countless times, I finally had the opportunity to dine here right before the lunch rush.

To be honest, I was startled by the prices; I looked up the menu online before coming here and was expecting to pay ~$14 for a Bowl Gogi (think: Korean Chipotle). With the $1 price increase on the Bowl Gogi and lunch boxes, I decided to get the Spicy Pork Lunch Box instead. After all, it comes with more - beef gyoza, egg roll, broccoli, macaroni salad, omelette, and kimchi.

The price became more palatable when I saw the generous size of the lunch box. Because the rice (I opted for half white rice and half brown rice) came in a separate container, the largest compartment was full of meat; I was extremely pleased when I had a containerful of meat leftover to take home.

Now on to the taste. The spicy pork was delicious but not spicy, and the beef gyoza and egg roll were well fried. The broccoli was a bit raw for my taste (I like my vegetables cooked unless I am eating a salad), and the macaroni salad and omelette were as expected. The kimchi, however, was confusing. The portion was tiny, and it was overly sweet - is this normal for ripened kimchi? I am not Korean - whereas I prefer something sharper to cut through the meatiness of the spicy pork.

Overall, Bowl Gogi is a good lunch option despite the higher prices (yes, I know Downtown Bellevue is expensive) if you can get two meals out of one order here. A...

Today around noon while ordering my bowl, the staff member (Asian female wearing glasses) dropped a piece of spring mix onto the counter. Instead of discarding it as one normally would do, she picked it up and placed it directly into my bowl. I pointed out that this was unacceptable, and although she removed the leaf afterward, the situation left me feeling very uncomfortable about the hygiene practices at this place.

What made the experience worse was that there was no apology, no acknowledgment, and the staff member carried on with a completely robotic and detached demeanor. I could have asked her to redo the entire bowl but for the time being I did not and that was being nice enough.

I don’t know if this was just a one-off thing or has been common practice at this place or by this staff member. But whichever way I’ll not be...

Generally a great food experience... they no longer have 15 mins free parking like they used to unfortunately as parking is absolutely non-existent. ordered 4 lunch boxes and they didn't have the advertised items in the meal... was highly substituted which I would have preferred they told me ahead of time. also they acted very pressed by me ordering 4 lunches at once without ordering online but as I told them, their website no longer accepts orders. This place was a lot better when they first opened... everyone seems less concerned with the customer experience now. they also had k-pop videos blasting on a large TV right in the...