Earlier in March, Wes & I finally took my belated birthday trip to Carrollton, TX for 3 days of eating & shopping. 🚗 It kind of became an "OMG, I can't believe we both survived the insanity of our Q4 2025 & Q1 2026 work schedules" celebration trip. 🙌 I usually like to try new restaurants, but we've been keeping a list of places that we want to return to so that's what we did this time around. We also visited two art exhibits ... and I took A LOT of pictures so that'll be for the next blog post. 📷
We got into Dallas for lunch. 🐖We went to the Arlington location of Hurtado BBQ back in 2024 and wanted to try the Dallas location this time around. It was much bigger and nicer; the Arlington location is more of a BBQ stand and this is an actual restaurant. Hurtado is Wes's favorite BBQ place, so I asked him what he thought and he said the food was just as good as he remembered. 😋 I (unknowingly) got two spicy sides -- elote and bacon potato salad-- so my meal was a little too hot, but it was still really good.
After lunch, we stopped in Coconut Paradise for drinks to bring back to the hotel. We always stay in the Marriott Courtyard Carrollton Dallas; one of these trips I'll actually take some pictures of it. 🏢 It is in the best location - right by the highway with Carrollton Town Center on one side of it, and the Korean shopping center on the other side. And it's right next to Wal-Mart, for when we forget to pack something. LOL Wes got the guava longan coconut water and I got the rose lychee soda from Coconut Paradise.
We went to BCD Tofu for dinner. 🍚 It was a Tuesday night, but the parking lot was packed. All the best restaurants are in Carrollton Town Center so it shouldn't have been a surprise, but I didn't expect so many people to be dining out on a weeknight. We both got the soon tofu combo, which came with traditional Korean banchan, tofu soup, and a smaller version of an entrée. I forgot about the combo and initially suggested that we each get a tofu and split an entrée, but Wes reminded me about it; and good thing too because it was SO MUCH food!! Everything was delicious, as usual. 🐟 I went with the mackerel this time.
The next morning, we went to 85℃ Bakery for breakfast. One opened up in Edmond, OK but it isn't as good as the ones in TX. (There wasn't as much selection at the one back home.) My one complaint is that 85℃ changed their policy and now they won't heat up the savory pastries for you. 😒 I guess they assume everyone is getting their stuff to go, and can heat it up at home or work. Anyway, I got an 85℃ roll and a chocomatcha bun, and Wes got a coconut something and a guava something else. LOL I tried their sea salt caramel coffee again because it was listed as a "favorite" drink. It was way too salty the last time I got it, but I customized it to "less salt" this time and it was really good. ☕
For lunch we went to the Walnut Hill location of Blue Sushi Sake Grill. 🍣We went to another location one other time but decided this was the better one. Blue Sushi has Wes's all-time favorite sushi roll -- the Godzilla roll. 🐲 He got that along with the cherry bomb. I got one roll with faux tuna and a roll with actual tuna, for a side-by-side comparison. They both tasted the same to me. LOL The vegan tuna roll had a bunch of other stuff in it, so maybe that masked the vegan-ness of the tuna. It also had vegan caviar on top, which was a first for me.
We originally planned to drive into Dallas for dinner at Nando's, but thunderstorms were in the forecast so we stayed in Carrollton. ⛈ We had dinner at DAQ Korean Chicken (it was a Mad for Chicken the last time we were here). The concept, and Wes noticed even the decor & table arrangement, was the same though - spicy Korean fried chicken. 🍗Wes got the chicken tenders with Korean sweet sauce. He wasn't impressed saying it wasn't spicy or complex. I got the shrimp fried rice, which was good but definitely needed the sauce that came on the side. It would have been way too bland without it.
🌧💧The thunderstorm warning turned into a flash flood warning throughout the evening. 💧🌧 It started pouring while we were eating. ☔ I was hoping we could wait it out, but the rain was not letting up. Luckily, we parked pretty close to the restaurant so the walk to the car wasn't bad, but all the close spots at the hotel were taken so we had to park pretty far away and were completely drenched when we got to our room. 😫 The worst part was that DAQ wasn't even that good to be worth getting all soggy for.
Our last meal of the trip was breakfast at the food court in Ranch 99. I always get my congee, but I might have to change it up the next time we go. They had so much good stuff out!! A lot more than previous times we've been. 🍲 They had their entire line up of dim sum options, rice bowls with pork belly, and so many good lunch & dinner options that I wanted to buy, but Wes reminded me that perishables don't do well in the car for the long drive home 😔 After eating, we got our grocery list items from the store (mostly stuff for my mom; we found the absolute cutest Ranch 99 tote bag!) and headed home.
Oh yeah, I mentioned we did some other (non-grocery) shopping. 💸 A friend told me about Dillard's Clearance Centers in Lewisville & Irving. Wes needs new work shoes, so we went to both locations to look for some. No luck. 😑There wasn't much at the Lewisville location and the Irving location didn't have men's shoes at all. I did end up with a new work out top for Pilates. I say "non-grocery shopping", but we mostly got food & snacks. LOL There isn't much else we really need in our minimalist life... but there is always room for snacks. 🍭🍪 We stopped in the Denton Buc-ee's on the way home and loaded up! They had an entire baby aisle, and I wanted to buy everything for Ezra, but Lacey & her mom take frequent Buc-ee's trips with him so I restrained myself.
There was some cute stuff at Daiso and Teso Life, but I didn't buy too much. We only got snacks from Teso. I think it's because a Daiso opened in Oklahoma, so it's no longer a treat to come here. I was super disappointed with Kinokuniya 😠 Lacey & I have started collecting trinkets to set out as ⭐good luck charms⭐ to help us during crochet night. I had an entire list of tokodoki ones I was going to get for us. Kinokuniya had literally every other blind box imaginable, but not a single tokidoki.
In between all our amazing meals, we went to the Balloon Museum and the Dallas Art Museum. 🎨We had two very different experiences at each art exhibit. Give me a minute to get my pictures together and I'll write all about it!!
