Cafe Aloe — Restaurant in Bellevue

The baked goods and sandwiches are so good. I love pineapple buns so I waited for them to finish the morning batch so we could get some. They were very polite in telling me that it would be 20 minutes until the next batch of baked buns would be ready and I happily agreed to wait.

I was disappointed that though I waited 45 minutes (10:15-11am) after ordering them, they decided to replace my pineapple buns with other baked goods because they didnt have enough for sandwiches they sold after I ordered. I waited that long only because we were excited for those buns.

I totally understand why they did it, as sandwiches sell for higher price, but I do not agree with them essentially selling what I already paid for to someone else after allowing me to wait so long for my order.

I wasn’t going to leave a review, but those buns were for my daughter and she was disappointed when we didn’t have them. And that was the point that I was annoyed thinking back about how they sold them to me and then I didn’t even get them when they came out of the oven.

It was my first visit here and I felt I was very patient and tipped well. So after all of this, I feel that not giving me what I waited nearly an hour for was bad business. Though I enjoyed these pastries so much, I cant really justify returning after this kind of treatment. I live too far away to drive 30 minutes only to wait 45 more for food that may or may not be given to me after I paid for it. If i had gotten what I paid for (we spent $70 on food/drinks), I would have not mentioned the wait and left a higher review.

Stars for the good food. But I won’t return. I hope this review causes them to rethink knowingly...

Really wanted to love this place, but it’s a hit and miss.

Drinks were just ok, nothing for me to crave for & it tends to be too sweet for me

As a lot of the reviews said, know that ordering majority of the food here can take quite a long time, even longer than some restaurant food bill times of 10 min, so just be prepared for that.

Prices are on the higher side, but hey it’s Bellevue. $6 for 3pcs of Shrimp dumplings is higher than the usual price of dim sum for example. But again, it’s understandable because of the area.

Pineapple bun sandwiches are good. The piggy buns you have to eat right away or it wouldn’t be as good. Unfortunately the fillings was too sweet for me and my 9 year old . Reminds me of the frozen animal piggy buns you can buy at the Asian grocery store at Hmart/99 ranch, which I just steam at home.

The place looked clean and aesthetically pleasing. I would sometimes see people working on their laptops while having their drinks on the side.

Customer service unfortunately on the times I have been there —not the best. Not a smile in sight or a friendly welcoming vibe. They aren’t being rude, just lacking when it comes to standard hospitality industry. As a cafe, I think they can really stand out and elevate their business a lot more if they connected more often with their guests, creating memorable first impressions for first time customers and developed even...

One more thing to add: the pork bun did not look cute like how it does below this review . Like mine was cracked open. Sad sad excuse for a bun. If it looked like the bun below sure $4.5 would be fine. Now that shows me inconsistency of served food items. Sadness. Dropped it down one more star.

Cafe Aloe was promising. I tried several items and found some of them very underwhelming. The Xiao long bao were ok. The soup seaped out and couldn't enjoy it how it was intended to be eaten. The pork bun at $4.5 should be a crime. It was the size of a dollar coin or the lid of a regular sauce ramekin (-_-). Don't get it if you are hungry. If you eat like a bird, maybe it would be alright for you. Just head to H-Mart or Uwajimaya you'll be happier. Also I got a cookies and cream latte without the coffee. They should have said it would taste like milk with cream, no sweetness. I'll just say that was my bad since I don't drink coffee but still it would have been better service to suggest something else other than milk and cookie pieces, with some crema. Sigh.

Now for the good things. The pineapple bun was delicious. It is what saved this review. Get the sandwiches. Any of them. They are worth over looking the first sad experience of my review. It was delightfully satisfying. I would return just for...