Korean Tofu House — Restaurant in Seattle

The food here is fantastic, and the owner is very sweet and welcoming. I've been a regular for six months.

However, the new server is not someone I appreciate.

Let me explain:

I always order the Korean army stew, one of my favorites, usually extra spicy. While the spice level is generally not adjustable, they sometimes make it spicier for me if I ask. I like to switch up the add-ons.

I once asked if I could add tteokbokki to my stew. She said no, which I understood, it wasn't offered as a option. I asked for ramen and cheese instead, which is an option for a charge. She took my friend's order and left.

My stew arrived without ramen or cheese. I mentioned it to her, and she said she had asked if I wanted it, and I had said no. Not wanting to waste food, I decided to eat it as it was-- especially cause she said they'd have to remake the whole thing. She reluctantly took it back to the kitchen and returned with just ramen. I assumed she was new and it was a busy day, so maybe she was overwhelmed.

A few weeks later, I tried again with the same waitress. This time, I ordered the stew, extra spicy if possible, and specifed NO ramen or cheese. My friend ordered the same stew with ramen. Then, I asked to order the tteokbokki with cheese as side order, pointing it out on the menu, to make sure I was clear.

She smiled and left.

My stew came back with cheese and extra rice cakes, while my friend's order was correct.

Usually, mistakes like this don’t bother me, but this felt like a deliberate "screw you" for the previous time. It makes me hesitant to eat here when she’s working.

This is the first issue I've had, and it’s not that deep—I still love the stew regardless—but I feel unwelcomed at this point.

Overall, the owner and staff are great. I'll just check if she's working...

Alright food, decent portions, but service is a big hit or miss. There's variance in everything which leads to inconsistent experiences. It's probably one of the most popular tofu houses around here in the U-District though and I'm not too impressed yet most of my friends prefer it.

To be fair, it's consistently busy so I understand sometimes service can be off, but a majority of the time it feels like they don't care unless it's empty in which case you're still going to have to flag someone down, but they're at least reachable. When it's busy, they just walk by you or ask for a second but never return.

Generally at most tofu houses, a tofu soup along with rice and side dishes is a splendid meal. Here, the tofu soup is fine but I've had quite a few visits where they won't refill my side dishes (banchan), the most recent reason given was because they "had to save them." Thing is, most of the side dishes provided are really tasty and delicious, but it's standard to have unlimited refills for the banchan.

I'd suggest getting just the beef bulgogi that comes with rice over the hot pot bulgogi with remarks from a friend as well. The bulgogi in the hot pot isn't as flavorful and juicy as the bulgogi alone.

Seafood pancake is always a great staple to order. It's pretty good here when you get the right pieces, but some pieces can be shrimpless and sometimes soggier than the other pieces, so there's some inconsistency in pieces. You can hit the jackpot and get the most delicious piece or you can be unlucky and snag an underwhelming piece.

Overall, service is often extremely disappointing and I'd lean towards a 1 star if it weren't for some pleasurable experiences from...

I have come to this place over the span of 10-12years. I used to come a few times a month (10years ago) and then I came about once a month after its 50% price surge (around 7-8years ago). Until these last couple years, the quality of food and its price have become wildly disproportional by year. Although the taste of food remains the same (recipes didn't change), the quality of the ingredients have visibly declined as the prices have doubled. (What used to be $10.99 is now 21.99, and you see the same up charges on everything on the menu). Despite the price, the quality of food is what draws me to write this review. The pork in BBQ spicy pork used to be good length size and thick; now the pork looks like some skimmed off meat almost like minced pork that you can barely pick up an intact piece with chopsticks. Same thing goes with bulgogi. Short ribs in BBQ short ribs become smaller and fattier. They even skimmed the rice - I had my first purple rice from their restaurant 12years ago, and now they purple rice barely purple cuz they added much less wild sweet rice into it. (Left picture from my recent visit, right picture from one of the reviews from 8years ago - see the color difference)

Last couple years, I have put this restaurant from my go-to list to my watch list. Each year I will go once and come back disappointed. It confirmed again and over that the quality doesn't match with the price increase. They no longer hold the hearts of long term customers. Maybe they are still getting enough business from the new innocent customers who are willing to pay high and settle for less. But I don't see how this is the way to do a long...