Dining and drinking review: Happy Belly Cuisine + Juice Bar

Review and photos by Ted Broussard

Happy Belly Cuisine + Juice Bar is located at 1122 Market Street

Happy Place
Here’s my new favorite definition of what kind of food I like: “Feel good food …food you can feel good about eating that makes you feel good.” What’s not to like about that? Happy Belly is all about feel good food. With a 90% vegetarian menu, they describe their menu as “vegetarian focused” but still offer a few dishes with available add-on protein like smoked salmon and quality deli meats. With a full service smoothie/juice bar and locally sourced coffee and tea, Happy Belly serves up breakfast, lunch and dinner with a healthy spin.

We’ve had lunch there a couple of times now and so far, it’s a keeper. Everything tastes fresh, as you might guess, but more than that, the food options just have great flavor. The Ham/Basil/Brie sandwich spotlights the big three ingredients but balances them perfectly with garlic herb butter on toasted sourdough bread. It comes with a cup of the house soup, Roasted Red Pepper and Kale, and has just enough spice to give it personality and big flavor. The Sweet Yellow Curry is another standout in terms of flavor. Picture if you can a deep plate of golden raisin, green apple, carrot, zucchini, mint, snap pea, basil, celery, onion, and bell pepper on a bed of fresh spinach, with slivered almonds mixed together with Non-GMO brown rice. Beautiful to look at and even better to eat! On my most recent visit I tried the Smoked Salmon sandwich, just to give the other 10% a try. It was a winner as well, with a deep stack of tasty smoked salmon piled on a slice of toasted gluten-free bread, with a spread of savory yogurt (basil, dill, capers, pickled red onion) plus arugula. I decided to live it up and instead of the house soup, I tried the house salad: beets and feta. It was very simply done with fresh beet cubes, a light balsamic dressing, and generous crumbles of feta cheese. It was very good; nothing heavy-handed and very tasty.

While we love the mains we’ve tried so far, the desserts didn’t quite make it to the “A” list for us. The Green Tea and White Chocolate Cookies were delicious, but pretty hard on the teeth unless you like chewing on rocks. The flavor was great but they were begging to be dunked in milk or some kind of beverage. It may have just been an off day because they were not quite so hard on a different visit. The one dessert we can say we did not like was the Coconut Ginger Honey Pop. With some of my favorite flavors like peanut butter, honey, pumpkin, ginger, oats and sunflower seeds, I had great hopes that I would love it, but it reminded me more of a “healthy” dessert that’s more about being good for you rather than tasting good. I’d stick to the cookies and smuggle in a little milk in case you need to dunk them.

The space itself is very small, with only 18 chairs, and they’re located right next to the Downtown YMCA parking lot. They do a take-out business as well and I haven’t had difficulty being seated yet. Service is outstanding. The owners are very friendly and welcoming and all the servers were polite, friendly and helpful.

Happy Belly is a great addition to downtown Tacoma. While it’s probably not a place I’d think of for a nice dinner out, it’s perfect for lunch or a light, healthier meal for an early dinner. With delicious and beautiful, healthy food and great service, Happy Belly is fast becoming my belly’s happy place.