Mixing Bowl Tysons Mall

Mall food usually brings to mind pizza by the slice or heated metal troughs of food and red serving trays. Tysons has done well in avoiding the stereotypes of the food court, but even the better options available in the mall trend on the side of franchised or repetitive. Enter Mixing Bowl, a new Korean food stop that just opened last week.

I found out about it via 3 levels of twitter retweets (the power of social media) and was sold when I heard korean bibimbop without a 20 minute wait. The idea is simple but beautiful. All of the components traditionally found in Korean cuisine provided in a pick and choose format. Kimchee and pickled veggie fans will be very pleased by the numerous flavors and varieties. Korean bbq fans will love the nearly 1/3rd price compared to more formal Korean barbecues in town.

I went straight for the Kimchee bibimbop with the spicy sauce. It was 8 bucks and ended up being more than enough to fill me up… I gotta admit even when I was full I just had to finish it.

Mixing Bowl prides itself in the use of fresh and all natural ingredients. All meats are free of antibiotics and the produce comes from local sources only. Behind the small start up’s business model and product is the idea of community and charity. Mixing Bowl supports both Alternative House (helping homeless teens, at-risk youth, and young mothers by providing them with shelter, food, counseling, and support) and SPARC (helping young adults with lifelong physical and/or mental disabilities by providing opportunities to contribute to the community, to learn, and to foster their unique abilities). We think both of these charities show the ground up message and optimism that comes from a small business like Mixing Bowl.

Behind the entrepreneurial spirit and great community involvement is high end Korean food provided and prices we all could use in tough economic times. We think more small businesses like Mixing Bowl are just one of the promises of an urbanized and community in Tysons.