Hibachi Grill Supreme Buffet

Very typical of your greasy Chinese food buffet save the Asian music videos overhead. It’s no Todai or sleek Korean BBQ buffet. I did appreciate that everything seemed fresh and hot even though it was Monday lunch (i.e. their least busy day).
Its strengths:
+ Seafood (clams, salmon)
+ Mongolian grill bar
+ Fresh sushi (the fried and creamy kinds alongside sashimi)
+ Chocolate fountain
+ A variety of DYI hand-​scooped ice cream options (at least 8)
+ Any fried chicken dish (the peanut chicken was a nice surprise, as was the spicy chicken)
+ Broccoli in garlic sauce
+ Wide, fresh variety of cool items (i.e. lychee, cantaloupe, honeydew, oranges, pineapple; full salad bar)
Its weaknesses:
— Like any greasy Chinese buffet, atmosphere: plastic dishes, old serving utensils, dim lighting, scratched up tables
— No DYI drink/​soda/​tea/​coffee bar
— No Peking duck
— No made-​to-​order phở
— It would be nice to have sticks without marshmallows so you could dip other things (Chinese donuts, fruits) into the chocolate fountain
— Anything American (the sweet potatoes with marshmallow tasted fake, as did the hardly cheesy mac and cheese)
All in all, given the large and fresh variety, I would definitely bring my Asian family and relatives here but not my millennial foodie friends unless they had insatiable appetites!!!

The hibachi area of this place is awesome! The chef makes it up right in front of you, and the flavors are excellent! Ask for it spicy! So good.

Actual food and service review below, but first:
This is the only place I have ever eaten where I feel very physically uncomfortable after leaving. Specifically a very strong over-​full feeling that is nearly debilitating. I have eaten in a lot of places all over the world, and at buffets in many place in the country, and never feel like this. I am not going to suggest they load their food with polysorbates, but yesterday as I stood by my vehicle wondering if I was going to be able to effectively continue my day after eating here. I observed several other people leaving with that «not so comfortable» look on their face.
I know, I know… you are saying, «you just ate like a pig you fool! Stop with the conspiracy theories!». But consider this; this is the ONLY place that this has ever happened to me and it is every time. I’ll be sure to never let that happen again by never coming back.
I’ll get to the food quality in a bit.
Also consider, this day, I was looking for «healthy food» because I am watching what I eat most of the week (I know you are laughing right now because I went to a buffet). But, I knew I could get sushi here.
So, granted, I had two modestly full (not stacked, single layer with space left on those tiny plates) plates of sushi. I always REMOVE most of the rice from the nigiri sushi (fish on rice only) but you cant do that with the the Maki (rolls). So really, they are half plates of food with those small plates they provide. I do this everywhere and dont have the problem I have here.
I had one small plate of hibachi that was literally a half a plate once cooked. a little pork, peppers, onions and mushrooms, that’s it.
Then a modest plate of fresh fruit. That’s all I had, and still felt like I was carrying a baby when I was done. I eat this way at all Chinese buffets that have sushi and hibachi griddle and never have this sensation elsewhere. So, I’m just saying, eat at your own risk. Large amounts of polysorbates, IF they are in your food are not good and it is known this can be added to foods for a full sensation. Take my words or leave them.
So the food:
I dont eat from most steam tables at Chinese buffets, so that’s why I search out sushi inclusive places. BUT, this pace has 6 steam tables of buffet I think, one salad bar and one fruit bar, and the typical disgusting dessert bench/​bar that I never understand why people eat from… it all looks like plastic to me.
So the hot food buffets may be good… I wouldn’t know, I dont eat that stuff.
The salad bar was pathetic. Large enough, but clearly geared toward the «less than adventurous» American customer. A lot of stuff, but nothing I wanted, and I LOVE a salad and eat them all the time. I was excited to see Kimchee on the bar though, but it was not good. I took one bite and stopped there.
The sushi collection was minimal. Only 2 nigiri and the rest were rolls… a lot of them filled with fake Krab and non-​fresh fish type stuff… the stuff my fellow Americans eat and tell everyone they eat sushi… but they really haven’t, they’ve had «Maki», and most of it has no fresh, raw, fish. What was here was not bad though, so I was able to pick through and get decent stuff.
The Hibachi ingredients were good looking, albeit not a huge selection. The hibachi cook was a sourpuss. Most workers here do not smile much and do not seem happy at all.
The soup was disgusting looking as usual. All gelatinous with cornstarch or polysorbate thickeners (real Chinese people do not eat this junk or any other stuff they feed you at buffets)…why does anyone eat that muck? The one soup that is usually decent is the won-ton…and it had no won-​tons in it, the entire time I was there it was ignored by the staff. I did enjoy a taste of the broth though which is typically decent at most buffets.
I was most impressed by the fruit bar. I was very happy with the selection and quality of the fresh fruit. They also had the typical canned stuff… and I have to say the lychee looked disgusting; that was the one bad thing. I usually get those but would not eat what I saw this day.
All in all, the buffet is decent by average American consumer standards. The place is in some disrepair… and trust me, if the front of the house and bathrooms are patched together, you can bet your bippy the kitchen is worse.
I had quit going to the original buffet (China King) that used to be in a different location because the sushi and hibachi chefs were slackers. The sushi was never ahead of the consumption and the hibachi cooks were either frowning or not interested in cooking.
Attention to the customer and keeping up with demand here is better, but the personnel are still not happy people. I guess years of watching Americans over eat and waste food will make you that way.
Hopefully I will remind myself to never come back. It wont matter to them though… there are plenty of people coming to the trough to feed here. As long as they make money, they will not change… I suspect.

Food was good and the sushi was scary looking… but buffet sushi is always suspect. I would stay clear of the chocolate fountain. I think the chocolate has been there for a long time or they use cheap chocolate. Looks like it used to be a super nice place but time has run it down. The seats and tables could use a replacement. The hibachi looked amazing and fresh. Wish I had gotten something from it.

We enjoy this place. So many meat dishes! Yum! They really do need to fix the place up better. The booths are terrible some of them.
In fact, we planned to go there for Thanksgiving and then on to some shopping. Wonder if they are open today?

Been eating here right when they opened, maybe 4 – 5 year now?!?
It has been my favorite and love the Shushi.
The seating is deteriorating, today we saw all the vinyl is now all worn off on the majority of the booths. Food has been great, but it just is stating to feel dirty inside and my wife and I agreed that today was our last visit.

Pretty awesome buffet!
The food is good and it’s pretty affordable.
$ 11 ish a person for dinner.

It’s convenient if you want a lot of food without having to wait, but I wouldn’t go back. I had to pick and choose because most things were too oily. Their fish was tasty. Hibachi grill was ok, overcooked my broccoli. To preface, I don’t have high expectations for Chinese buffets, but I’ve had better than this.

I’ve eaten at AYCE (all you can eat) Chinese buffets throughout the Southeast, and this is one of the better ones! We stumbled in on a Saturday evening that advertised a special seafood buffet for $ 11.95. Compared to the buffets here in DC that charge $ 6 – 7 more than that, it seemed a real bargain. When we cruised the buffet tables, we saw the traditional buffet items — Chinese noodles, fried shrimp, broccoli beef, Korean ribs, and bourbon chicken — but we also spotted fried frog legs! And to their credit, they tried to make sure everybody had a stab at the highlight of seafood night — crab legs! At many Chinese AYCE buffets, there will be an auntie or grandma keeping an eye on the crab leg tray. As soon as the kitchen brings out a fresh supply, she’s there like white on rice, loading up her plate with 30 – 40 pieces to the frustration of other diners. At this buffet, however, there was a girl rationing out the leg, 4 – 6 per person. And the desserts — a chocolate fondue fountain where you could dip literally anything into the creamy waterfall — fruits, rice krispy squares, jello cubes, cookies, steamed shrimp — and nobody gives you a second look. And unlike those buffets that serve waxy soft-​serve «ice cream,» this one had real ice cream in those cardboard barrels like Baskin-​Robbins — just don’t go too late, because all the short kids were diving into the freezer case with their dirty hands and crumb-​laden cheeks to reach the ice cream, and you don’t want to end up scraping the bottom of the barrel, or so they say.

Our family come here often. Love the selections especially all of the seafoods, steamed crablegs! The staff is always friendly. Never a long wait. Prices are so good for all this seafood!

Could be cleaner, but what else do you expect from a former golden corral. Some of the food is over cooked (from sitting on the hot plates for hours), but their food is always being filled. And out of the other Asian buffets in the area, this is the best one.

Fried foods abound, mixed dishes heavy on thick sauces, or oils, some American fair.
Chairs & booths are terribly well worn,
Food is plentiful, but low on anything resembling healthy.
Yes, you can pick through the menagerie of high carb fried orange colored foods to find something green, but it’s not by any means abundant.
Food is tasty I suppose, as much as anything that is fried, covered in a sugary soy goo paste, with a heaping amount of salt, would be.
Go here if you want to appeal to a group of strangers, as the choices are abundant enough to satisfy most: but fair warning the fair is not particularly well made, or highly good for you …
As I recall the buffet is around $ 12.50 a plate with drinks 2 $ …

Hubby and I have eaten our way thru many buffets. We are trying to limit those visits for traveling. For $ 7.95 at lunch, this is a decent place to visit. We don’t come for stellar service or décor. The booths/​tables probably haven’t been replaced in several years. It is sad that I know which booths are uncomfortable or broken.
There are lots of nice choices on the salad bar. Each dressing is labeled so if you are paying attention, you won’t confuse cocktail sauce for ketchup. There is a hot grill where you can select which items you want cooked. My «staples» for any buffet are: vegetable lo men, fried rice, green beans & egg drop soup. There are lots of veggie and meat choices. The fruit is hit or miss. I have had wonderful and «mushy» watermelon.
The dessert bar is larger than it needs to be. You have choices of cake, pastries, ice cream and a chocolate fountain. Fruit and jello are also nice desserts.
Avoid the pizza and mac & cheese. It tastes industrial & rushed. The employees are nice enough to take orders and remove plates. Don’t expect warm fuzzies.

I would really love to give this four or five stars but, what I saw when I went was so extremely disturbing and annoying that I can’t.
The food was okay but perhaps the most exciting thing was the sushi bar! The sushi was above average for a buffet; I actually loved it, but I will offer the caveat that I am not perhaps the best judge because I only eat certain things and I just started eating it a year or two ago. But, nonetheless it was so good that’s pretty much all I ate.
As for the rest of the food, it was okay. Nothing to write home about, but nothing to keep me from going back. They had crab legs the night we went (Mother’s Day) but I didn’t get any. The cool thing is that they are rationed; I loved seeing this because I know everyone has seen people just pile their plates so ridiculously high when a buffet has crawfish and crab legs that they can’t even walk back to their table without holding the top of the stack on the plate! So, yea, I loved seeing the effort to monitor that so people eat least had a chance to get some.
They have a really awesome fruit bar, but unfortunately, no monitor there and the table next to us had some girls who made it their mission to abscond with all the watermelon… they would watch as it came out and then go running up to take whatever they brought out, then come back to the table laughing about, «haha, we got the last six pieces.» Which is a good Segway to the worst part the experience…
So, despite there being signs on every bar that «Kids Under the Age of 12 MUST be accompanied by an adult» there was no time that this was ever reinforced. I can’t recount the number of times kids did what they are best at doing… they would pick up the food up with their hands then throw it back in to the bin deciding they didn’t want it. Then when it came to the dessert buffet, unaccompanied kids couldn’t reach the cakes that were on the counter on platforms were holding up the line as they demolished the pieces they were trying to get as t hey were trying to get to the piece they want. I just gave up and went down to the ice cream container. The cool thing is that they actually had REAL ice cream! LIke Mint Chocolate Chip and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup!!! My two absolute fav’s!!! So, obviously they were in big containers as opposed to the little ice cream cups you often find at buffets. SADLY, because it was real ice cream, you needed to scoop it out… well, unfortunately most of the bins were almost to the bottom and/​or too hard for kids to get out, so all those kids who had no parents accompanying them had to jump up and IN to the ice cream bins so that their whole bodies were vitally submerged into the tubs. And let me tell you the line that they caused as they tried… wow… it was disgusting and ridiculous. Yet at no time did anyone that worked there stop it.
Aside from their unwillingness to enforce their rules, the host staff and the servers were all very friendly and fun– at least at our table. We enjoyed interacting with them and they were very prompt with our drinks and clearing our plates. And I felt horrible for them when I saw when what some of these families with kids who are old enough to know better DESTROYED the tables they occupied AND the floor around and underneath them. I understand if you kids under five, but kids older should know better and should have better manners and respect. But then again, these days, that just isn’t’ the case.
Overall, I enjoyed this place. I am looking forward to go back, first and foremost for the sushi, and, second for the ice cream, minus submerged kids in the bins.

As far as Asian buffets go, the quality here is certainly lacking. This is no Todai, but it is also half the price. A couple friends and I came here on a Saturday night with a $ 2-​off coupon, and the final price ended up being $ 11.50 after tax. That’s probably the cheapest dinner buffet I’ve ever been to.
So this is definitely about quantity over quality. I mostly stuck to the seafood items — the sushi, crab legs, fried frog legs, whole fried fish, white fish fillet, clams, mussels, and plenty of sweets. On the plus side, I didn’t get sick from it! They were all pretty mediocre though, especially the sushi. The exception was the whole fried fish — that was actually tasty and tender. Other highlights were the fusion-​y egg custard tart, which came in a phyllo dough cup (I had 3…), and the coffee tiramisu-​esque cake square. Hmmm I think that might be it. The fresh pineapple was not sweet at all. The rice krispie treat was stale, the ice cream just tasted weird, like soap… the shellfish were acceptable but nothing to come back for. The fried tofu was chewy and meh. Maybe the land meats are better? But I wouldn’t count on it.

Gluten-​free, vegan hell.
But for the «normal» people out there — lots of choices, and decent food.

We always stop here when we are traveling from our home in the DC area to the family Thanksgiving get together. It’s a nice halfway stop, so the kids don’t have to be sitting in the car for more than 2 hours.
The foyer area features a neat little koi pond and a water wheel feature. The kids always love this for some reason, and it’s a good place for them to walk around a bit, stretch their legs, have something to look at besides the interior of a car.
We’ve been here 3 times, and we always been seated promptly. Drinks come with the buffet (endless refills) and their hot tea is pretty good. Waitstaff is always nice, friendly, and tolerant of children practicing their rudimentary Mandarin phrases with them. Used plates get picked up promptly.
There is a very large selection of choices. There is a hibachi grill (good, made to order) and a sushi bar (mostly it’s California rolls and the like) that is also well tended and fresh. If you are looking for the wakame salad (the seaweed shreds) it’s in the little pockets. It’s a tablespoonful of wakame salad atop a tiny bed of rice inside of a little pouch. Clever presentation — if you want more than a spoonful of wakame take more than one pouch.
If you have people in your party that aren’t into Asian food — don’t worry. They have mac and cheese, chicken wings, roast pork (excellent), fries (ok), baked salmon (REALLY good), chicken on a stick, and an extensive salad bar. They have lots of fresh fruit, too. They have something called a «meat pie» that I have never tried, but the tray of it always seems to be changed regularly, so I’m guessing it must be good.
The dessert bar is good — they have a chocolate fountain that my kids loved (marshmallows on a long stick to dip), hand dipped ice cream, and the usual cakes, cookies, and rice crispy treats.
The soups are good. Egg drop is good — the hot and sour is really good. The crab Rangoon wasn’t as crispy this time as it usually is — it was still good though. Their spring rolls are better than the egg rolls, IMO, but the egg rolls are good too. The lo mein is ok but nothing special. The rice noodle dish is much better. The egg foo young is good, and they do an awesome mushrooms with oyster sauce. The standards (beef broccoli, chicken stirfry, Tso’s chicken) are all pretty much your standard. Not awesome, but ok even by more metropolitan standards. Vegetables are not overcooked, and the trays are changed regularly. The BBQ pork is WAY less greasy and salty than other places I’ve had it. They have clams and mussels, prepared a couple of different ways. All of them are good.
The rice is always perfect — the steamed rice anyway. I have no idea about the fried rice since I never eat it. I tried the sweet and sour chicken. Too much breading and the sauce was too sweet — but this would probably be perfect for many. Ditto the curry chicken — it’s bland. Again, this would probably appeal to many.
Condiments are on the end of the salad bar — so if you need some siriachi to liven up a dish — it’s there.
Best thing about this place? The price. If you come for lunch — it’s only 6.95. Kids are 4.75. Weekends it’s 8.95 for adults. Dinner is pretty cheap too — 10.95, and 5.75 for kids.

To be clear, me giving three stars to a Chinese buffet is PRETTY impressive.
I have never been to a buffet that had so many choices before. I was almost overwhelmed as to all I wanted to eat compared to the little appetite I have. Surprisingly, the food here for the most part is fairly good for cheap buffet food. Well, it at least is satisfying for the amount you pay (which is very cheap, God bless). When I am feeling like a hungry hippo and don’t want to pay a lot, this is where I’d go.
Side note: Their ice cream is actually good.
Another side note: Don’t get too excited over sushi, it’s disappointing.

My family and I are fans of buffets so if you don’t like buffets in general, this is probably not a place you’d like. But if you’re into variety and reasonable pricing (comes down to about $ 10/​person and there’s a discount for UVa students and those older than 65), you’ll enjoy this place.
There’s your standard selection of Chinese food — some dishes more authentic than others, like Szechuan-​style string beans, steamed flounder, alongside more American-​style dishes like General Tsao’s chicken and hot and sour soup. There’s also a nice selection of sushi and a small Hibachi-​like grill where you pick your own raw ingredients and they stir fry them for you. There’s a chocolate fondue fountain, which sounds from other reviewers like it might have been from the previous restaurant, but it adds a nice touch, and a small selection of desserts and sliced fruits.
There was a somewhat strange shortage of soup bowls at one point. There were no bowls near the soup so when I asked one of the employees, he said they were all being washed. I thought that was a little strange but they got the bowls out shortly thereafter. The employees do a decent job wiping down the counters to pick up small spills so that the buffet areas are nice and clean. I’m generalizing a little bit but being Chinese-​run and a buffet, don’t expect a lot of customer service other than the waitresses picking up your plates when you’re done polishing off your food.
This isn’t gourmet food per se, but it does have a generous selection and good value for about $ 10 per person. And if you’re into buffets but don’t like Chinese buffets in particular, Woodgrill Buffet is about one plaza away and also worth a try.

So, I’ve probably been here more times than any other place in Charlottesville — and I’m not sorry about that in the slightest.
We’ll start off by saying that this is a buffet — if you want more authentic gourmet Chinese food, this is not the place to get it. However, if you’re a fan of Chinese buffets or Chinese delivery food, you are going to LOVE this place. It has so many options — salad bar, various fruits and vegetables, and many different types of meat. The variety alone is worth the price of admission (between $ 7 – 12 per person depending on the time of day — UVA students get 10% off with student ID). I would rate this as above-​average-​for-​a-​Chinese-​buffet food, and I’ve never had any problems with freshness or it being cold (also please try the cheesy bread — it’s a flaky bread outside with a generous amount of the same sweet filling you taste in wantons/​ragoons).
On top of that, they have a stir-​fry grill in the back — just put the ingredients you want on your plate and the cook will fry it up right in front of you. Next to that is a sushi bar — again, it’s not sushi from that high-​end place you like in the city, but it is hands-​down the best buffet sushi I’ve ever had, and it beats out some of the more «authentic» (which is a synonym for «overpriced») DC sushi places I’ve been to in my humble opinion.
Overall, this is one of my favorite places to eat in Charlottesville, and I always seem to find myself ending up there time and time again. The quality of the food (even the sushi if you’re not a snob) and the low price makes this place worth it.