Our 15 Best Seattle Dishes of 2020 (Part 1)

This is always one of our more enjoyable posts to create every year.  It allows us to review all the great dishes we’ve had throughout the year and debate which ones belong in our top 15. When we first started on this post, we thought we’d have a hard time finding 15 dishes considering that we haven’t been out much due to Covid-19. We were able to hit up a lot of spots early in the year, did a ton of take out and visited some places when things started opening back up in the Fall.  Surprisingly, we didn’t have any problem and actually had a hard time whittling it down to 15.

Without further ado, here are our Best Seattle Dishes of 2020, 15 through 8:

 

Ohaiyou Gozaimasu means “Good Morning” in Japanese, which categorizes this as sort of a breakfast burger with egg and bacon as two of the ingredients.  Messy and huge with some of our favorite simple ingredients egg, bacon, cheese, but what sets this apart is the Japanese mayo they use and the encrusted fried burger. Maybe higher than it should be, because I remember being super hungry(a bit hung over) and just inhaling this gigantic burger, thinking it was one of the best meals on earth.

14.Musang – $15.00. Adobong Pusit Pancit – hand-caught squid by Musang / bihon / tinapa.

Musang was just names Seattle Met Magazine’s Restaurant of the Year and this was our favorite from this establishment. I believe our server said this was their best selling dish. It’s a nice spin on a traditional Filipino dish. Pancit bihon is typically a translucent rice noodle, but in this case it’s squid ink black.  In addition to bits of tender puncit(squid), there’s also bits of tinapa(dried fish). Citrus flavor from the vinegar in combination with the savory from the tinapa provided a nice balance to the dish.

13. Family Donut Shop – $2.50. Apple Turnover

First of all, look at the size of this thing. We took a picture of the apple turnover on a plate with a butter knife for scale.  The apple turnover is a favorite of our family and due to its size, everybody gets their fare share. The turnover has a thick crust of glaze and cinnamon crumbles, which matches perfectly with the apple filling inside. Many times when getting apple turnovers from other donut shops, there is a minuscule amount of filling, but the Family Donut Shop has a massive amount of filling as you can see in the picture above. Pair this with a nice cup of coffee and it’s the perfect way to start your day.

12. Nue – $15.00(Happy Hour), $18(Regular). Chengdu Spicy Jumbo Chicken Wings, Green Szechuan peppercorn, fish sauce, lime, chili, basil, mint and Thai chili.

Nue was one of the last places we were able to visit prior to Covid-19 shutting down restaurants in Seattle. There are a lot of interesting dishes that they serve here from various cuisines from around the world, but Chengdu chicken wings was our particular favorite. Check out the presentation of this dish. The jumbo wings come piled on top of each other on a giant vertical skewer. Nice balance of sweet, spicy and savory as well as crispy and tender. Also love that they use jumbo wings instead of normal smaller wings. A layer of spices at the bottom allows you to add more to the wings to your tasting.

11. Cafe Turko – $17. Abdullah Sauteé -Tender juicy lamb cubes served as a blanket on baked eggplant moussaka

We’ve been to Cafe Turko in Fremont on many occasions and were glad when they continued with take out while we were stuck indoors. Trying to support local restaurants we’ve been doing a lot of take out and the Abdullah Sautee is a dish we order often. The Abdullah Sautee has tender gigantic chunks of lamb that’s served with a small salad and rice pilaf. Not sure what type of sauce and spice they use, but it’s damn good.  There is such a wide variety of dishes at Cafe Turko and they’re all good, so it’s easy to want to try them all, but this is the one we stick to. The portion of lamb is so generous, we make rice at home and add any leftovers to create a brand new dish.

10. Bizzarro Italian Cafe -$19.25. Elk Bolognese- Wild Oregon Elk with fennel, thyme, Mama lil’s peppers and pork shoulder slowly simmered into a creamy ragu tossed with our handmade parpardelle ribbon pasta.

Excerpt from our blog post:

I’m a sucker for a ragu sauce and how often can you find elk on the menu. This is probably their most popular dish. I was expecting a bit of gamey, but there was none. One thing I loved about the dish is they are not chintzy on the meat. Normally the meat to pasta ratio is decidedly heavy on the pasta side. This dish surprisingly was heavy on the elk side.  This is a comforting dish to have on a cold night.

9. Bok A Bok – $8. Yuzu Green Chili Chicken Sandwich – Charred pasilla peppers, dill pickles, pea sprouts, yuzu aioli-

Excerpt from our blog post:

Both the Umami BBQ and Yuzu Green Chile Chicken Sandwiches will be repeat orders for our family on future visits to Bok a Bok. I have no idea where they get these chickens from but they are so big that they dwarf the buns they come on. We especially enjoyed the Yuzu Green Chile Sandwich. It’s spicy, sweet and the slight tart from yuzu all blends very well with the chicken.

8. El Camion -$11.85.  Conchinita Pibil Sopes -Three thick handmade tortillas topped with your choice of meat or veggies, grilled onions, salsa avocado slices, and cotija cheese.

Pretty much anything you order at El Camion is damn good-burritos, quesadilla, gorditas, mulitas, tortas. They also have 9 types of meat to choose from.  We’ve been going to El Camion for years and now that a new location opened up in our neighborhood we visit on average at least once a week, but we only discovered this combination of Conchinita Pibil  + Sopes this year.  These are little slices of heaven and can truthfully be split up into three separate meals.  The sopes is dense enough to carry the weight of generous portions of pork and toppings of avocado, grilled onions and cotija cheese.  To top it off we normally request the guacamole salsa. It’s a perfect combination of flavors.

Stay tuned for our top dishes of 2020

Related:

• Our 15 Best Seattle Dishes of 2018 (Part 1)
• Our 15 Best Seattle Dishes of 2018 (Part 2)
• Our 15 Best Seattle Dishes of 2019 (Part 1)
• Our 15 Best Seattle Dishes of 2019 (Part 2)