The Spot Asian Food Hall — Restaurant in Rockville

Welcome to the Spot Food Hall The first thing you got to prepare for is how crazy and packed the place is. At sometimes it can be hard to tell where lines start but don’t worry, you will get the hang of it. Walkthrough and check out all the places and make a decision about what you want for food, drinks, and desserts. It can take some time to get each order since lines can get long and things are often made to order. Make sure you go with friends and divide and conquer by having one first get food, another one drinks, and then desserts.

Most likely you won’t find a spot (lol) in the hall area, but there is outside sitting that people often forget exists. It would help if one of the friends can save a spot while you get the food. Plus, the place gets very loud during its busy hours so make sure you stay nearby to listen for your order. All this hassle is worth it, and you are about to taste some very yummy things.

Taiwanese Fried Chicken @ CheersCut (5 NOMs) OMG, the giant piece of Taiwanese Fried Chicken is a must order at The Spot food hall. If you are not familiar with Taiwanese fried chicken, then we don’t know what you been doing. Go there right now and order one! Split it with a friend or eat the whole thing yourself because you are a hungry nomster. Not just a small piece, it’s half a chicken all for you. This perfectly light breaded and seasoned chicken will make your taste buds happy. Now, if you are a cool kid and familiar with this the fabulous world of Taiwanese fried chicken, then this will not disappoint and make you want to come back. You should find someone who looks as excited to see you as Boris with Taiwanese Fried Chicken!!

Noodle Soup @ Mian Pull Noodles (3 NOMs) Its time for some tasty freshly made noodles from Mian Pull Noodles. They make them right in front of you, combined with delicious broth and meat. With many different variations, we went for a combination of soup that includes it all. Nothing beats a mix of nice meat, tripes, and other parts. Noodles are very soft, and light so doesn’t let them sit for long or else they become soggy. We did think broth needed some kick to it. Make sure to grab some extra sauce to adjust seasoning to taste. You can also order some sides like Pig Ears which we normally like, but not this time. We will stick to the noodle soup.

Taro Bubble Tea @ Gong Cha (5 NOMs) Bubble tea is a perfect way to end a foodie adventure or a refreshment on a hot day, especially Taro Milk tea from Gong Cha. While they have many different and more exotic flavors, we decided to go for our favorite Taro Milk. One of the big things we love is how you control a level of sweets by going 100%, 50%, or 30%. You can do that in a lot of places, but not many make it very obvious to customers.

Poki Bowl @ Poki DC (5 NOMs) We are excited for that special kind of poke in our spot and now is the time to get poked, poked real good with a Spicy Salmon Poke Bowl from Poki DC stand at the Spot. It was fate that brought us here or as we call it, shorter line. We still not sure why the lines were short because this place rocked our taste buds. This is one of the newest locations for this local chain with several locations in DC, Maryland, and soon Virginia. So many different choices, we can put anything we want or maybe even every single topping.

Waffle Con Thai Ice Cream @ Alpaca Dessert (4 NOMs) Did you know that Alpacas is where the ice cream comes from? No, we are not that cute, but this cutely branded Alpaca Desserts sure make a great waffle cone Thai Ice Cream. As now trendy, this is to design your nomnom kind of place.

Waffle Ice Cream does take a bit of time to make, and you got to be nearby to hear your number called. So don’t go away like few people we say. Just in case your extra cuteness kicks in, they will keep your order for you in the fridge — what a great way to end this visit at the spot because sweetness...

After having terrible service and overpriced food months ago, a friend and I decided to try it again. We met up on Sunday and even though Michael wasn’t there (he is usually at the bar) we still went. We ordered all of our food from one restaurant and the kiosk machine. After sitting at our table for a 5-10 minutes. I decided to go and buy edamame. I asked for light salt. I was handed a buzzer and told to come back when the edamame were ready. I informed the guy I had placed an order through the kiosk as well but he stated it wasn’t an issue and the edamame would be out quickly. It took more than 15 minutes to receive the edamame. There was so much salt on them that my friend and I had to use napkins to wipe it off before eating. After we finished the edamame, I went back to check on our order. They apologized and said they were still working on it. After more than 25 minutes of waiting for sushi and dumplings. I went back. They told me it was still being made but should be done shortly. (It was not super busy) about 5ish minutes later it was ready and he called me back up. I took the sushi and cucumber salad and informed him of the 4 or 5 other items we had, he said don’t worry it’s coming. I told him the tiny thing of cucumbers was not what we ordered, we ordered the kani salad. He informed me that was the Kani salad. It was about 10 slices of cucumber with some sort of sauce on it. That “salad” was almost $6!!! You can buy an entire bag of cucumbers for less than $6 let along a couple of slices. We sat down to eat the sushi and realized there was no soy sauce. We were so hungry we just ate it. After we finished the sushi he called me back up to tell me the dumplings and other chicken dishes (katsu) needed to be picked up at another restaurant. Not understanding why (when we ordered everything from one restaurant) my friend we to pick it up, at this point it had been at least 45 minutes since we ordered and she was told it wasn’t done yet. I think this is absolutely ridiculous. We ended up ordered multiple bubble teas to keep from being super hungry. Eventually they told us the food was ready, when she brought it over we unpack packed and realized again, there was no sauces. I went back and asked for the gyoza sauce. The kid working there said they didn’t have any. I told him the dumplings will be super dry without them, he has to have sauce. He then told me I had to go back to the sushi restaurant and get all the sauces. Frustrated at this point I went back and asked for sauces. They informed me they can give me sushi sauces but the dumpling one has to come from the other one. I let them know they didn’t provide any sauces with our sushi. They then stated I had to ask for it… WHAT PLACE DOESN’T PROVIDE SOY SAUCE WITH SUSHI!?!

I again went back to the other restaurant asking for the sauce and informing him the sushi restaurant said he does have it. He had to ask someone else and then he brought out a small container of it. Overall TERRIBLE customer service. Food is overpriced and terrible. Sushi was the only thing that tasted good out of all the items we ordered, but didn’t have any soy sauce for dipping. My first experience was just as bad. Unfortunately I will not ever return. I added a picture of the “Kano salad” and snap shot of the sushi menu from the restaurant we ordered from.

I will also say the bubble tea place gong cha is consistently excellent, and makes all the teas exactly as you order it. However this is a restaurant chain and I would rather go to another location where I can get good food and service. Like the Asian food hall in...

Feb 2022 I've been coming here for years, mainly for the bubble tea. The staff is pretty friendly and the place is kept decently neat and clean. Note the bathrooms are on the far west side (the not-bar side). And the two entrances are on either side of the place. Those doors by the sidewalks are NOT for entering/exiting.

The specific (free) parking for The Spot is in two places. The first, at ground level, is the covered parking located between the west side of The Spot and the main entrance to the apartment complex. The second parking place is the left side of the top floor of an underground garage, the entrance located behind the apartment building. From the ground floor parking, you can reach the underground garage by driving through to the back of the building and then turning right. On the right, past a loading dock, is the entrance to the garage. From the garage is an elevator that takes you up to the shop level (I believe the button is labeled and the other buttons are locked for resident usage only). From the elevator, you walk straight to the double doors that lead outside. Once outside, turn right and the entrance to The Spot is on the right. You can return to the garage the same way.

The inside is pretty clean, with a mix of normal height tables/chairs and high tables/chairs. The bar area is partially partitioned off with a glass wall and doors

They now have self-order kiosks where you can order stuff from multiple places and they package it together for you to pick up at once. You pay by card (either by chip or tap) and you can print out the receipt too. There is also a scanner for your rewards QR code. Note the numbers for kiosk orders are separate from when you order in person at the counters. The kiosk asks for your phone number to send you a text when your order is ready. The pickup location is on the left side of Cheers Cut (sadly no signage yet).

We ordered something from four places: noodle soup, sushi, fried chicken, and bubble tea. The bubble tea was in its own plastic bag (with drink tray on the bottom for stabilization); everything else was packed into one paper bag. Some sauce ended up spilling in the bag. I highly suspect it was the small container of soy sauce for the sushi, and I recommend they give out those soy sauce packets instead of containers of soy sauce. More expensive, but no danger of spillage.

For the noodle soup, I was interested to see it was packaged like the ramen places are doing: one big bowl with soup at the bottom and smaller top compartment with the noodles and toppings. Sadly, they didn't give us a soup spoon, instead giving us a regular spoon. Both the soup and noodles were delicious and pretty good for the price.

The sushi was a bit disappointing. We got a California roll, Salmon Avocado roll, and Eel roll. There were generous portions of crab, salmon, and avocado, but little eel. To make things worse, the salmon and eel were pretty tasteless (eel less so because of the sauce). And, if you notice that sort of thing, the rice was also unflavored.

The fried chicken was very good, with Taiwanese teriyaki sauce in a separate container. Taiwanese teriyaki is different from Japanese teriyaki: less sweet with more garlic and ginger. The meat was mainly dark meat and lightly breaded. It had a good crunch and wasn't too oily.

The bubble tea was as good as ever, with strong flavors and no artificial taste. The Stawberry Matcha Latte tasted evenly of strawberry and matcha. The Strawberry milk tea was a bit too creamy for me (probably used whole milk) but...