Genghis Grill

They brought my daughter raw chicken, we are still hoping she does not end up with food poisoning! Other than the undercooked meat the food was average quality. The cook initially told us that all of their noodles are gluten free before checking with another cook who said they all have wheat in them! I’m so glad that we insisted he double check on the ingredients. This place is over priced and dangerous, eat at your own risk!!!

By far the worst restaurant in Gainesville. I can’t believe they’ve lasted this long without shutting down.
My first experience there when they first opened was going to be my last. Then i went again because the birthday girl I was celebrating with picked it for dinner. I was about to turn down the invite on account that I was so disgusted the first time but I thought, ehh, what the hell, let’s give it a second chance, maybe they got their act together. This second experience is definitely my last.
From both experiences everyone I was with could tell I was in complete disgust by the faces i was making. Walking in there it smells like raw meet and fish. You get to the buffet style area where u make your bowl and the smell intensifies with the added wiff of mold and mildew. There are clear health violations when u see mold growing so close to the raw food! Ew!
Then no matter what sauce u ask them to cook with, all the food ends up tasting the same and very spicy. They cook everything in the same place without cleaning after each order. I would NOT recommend this to anyone with food allergies.
Then the service takes forever. You have to be eating your spicy rice without anything to drink.
Needless to say I did not take leftovers home and I was queasy the next day.

Worst restaurant experience in Gainesville. So, let’s start off by saying that all of the ingredients, whether it is raw chicken, raw beef, raw cabbage, etc… It is all kept out in the open, buffet style. A HUGE sanitation issue. There is raw chicken literally sitting beside fresh vegetables. Anyone and everyone goes up to this «buffet» and chooses what to put in their bowl of food, like most buffets, after even just a few people the buffet area gets disgusting and food is all over the place. Let’s say you have a certain allergy, I would be extremely careful because all of the food products are exposed to one another. Not too mention people and all of the germs that they carry are walking up and handling the food. Let’s not forget to mention that all of this raw meet is left sitting out at room temperature. Perhaps this is the reason my friend got extreme food poisoning within a couple hours of eating here?
Second major issue: taste.
So after you have a bowl full with toppings (meat, veggies) you give it to the chef and they cook is all together hibachi style. If you think about it, certain vegetable do not take nearly a long to cook as let’s say, chicken or beef. Do the chefs care? Nope! Everything gets dumped together and cooked for the same amount of time until the meat is thoroughly cooked. The results: the meat is dry and everything else tastes burnt and dry as well.
Overall, not pleased. Will never return.

Friendly but the last asian restaurants i would suggest in Gainesvile.

Food was awful, service was mediocre, attracts the lowest of the low clientele. Seriously don’t go here. If you do go here play vegetarian. The meats are seriously awful quality. I ended up picking around the meat and eating my veggie and starch. Now I’m still hungry and out $ 23 before tip. Never again.

Food was delicious as always. Service was above and beyond. Both the manager and server were very attentive and friendly.

I love Mongolian but I don’t find it very often so on a trip to G’ville we stopped in to try it out. I love the idea of creating my own meal and putting exactly what I want into the dish. Yum, more veggies please. It’s fun, different, fresh and affordable. What more so you want?

The food was ok but the staff sucked. Besides being rude or ignored, the hostess was really mean. That and
says that this place had several violations for not cleaning, dirty water and cross-​contaminating food. :) Nothing says Asian food like food poisoning.

Horrible food. Overcooked and burnt. For a meal you have to do so much work to prepare yourself not worth the price. I will never go back.

Invented history can be fun. John Hancock signed the Declaration of Independence in today’s equivalent of caps lock not because he wanted King George to see it first, but because that’s how he always signed it, and his role as president of the Continental Congress dictated it be top middle. It does sound way better the other way, though.
Genghis Grill also puts fiction in the non-​fiction section with what they’ve dubbed Mongolian barbecue, in sort of an uncooked Ponderosa fashion. After assembly-​lining your choices as high as embarrassingly possible in a dog food bowl, your pick of protein and vegetables are dumped on a large, round griddle in a bullshit style that’s not Mongolian and hardly barbecue, according to my interneting. It’s like hibachi, except 40 feet away and your food, in the company of about a dozen other orders, gets the kind of individualized attention usually reserved for an auditorium lecture.
Invented culture aside, the food is what’s important. And my pieces of pork were fatty and overcooked. Udon noodles were too few and far between and the thick sauce was now watery and barely clinging to anything but the bottom of my new non-​dog food bowl. In Mongolian culture, they have a word for this: «Sh’bullit.»
It’s true, I swear.

This was my first time, and I just don’t get it. Interesting concept, you get a small metal dog dish (small dog less than 12lbs) to start with protein and fill up with vegetables to be grilled by the cook at the end of the line. My problem started immediately since I could not go beyond the concept of placing RAW chicken at the bottom of the dog dish, and than adding vegetables. All I could think off is what can I place on top that would at least expected to be cooked thoroughly. Forget about the cubed tofu, since to kill any germs associated with raw chicken needs cooking of 165 degrees and all corners would have to be cooked. Started looking for anything that would uniformly cook since food poisoning is not on my list of good times in Gainesville.
I am sure that there is plenty of hardy souls out there that would disagree, so enjoy. I will be back when we actually can get two dog dishes one for the protein and the other for vegetables.
Happy Dining.

Okay, i have visited this place 3 times in the last year. The first time my proteins were over cooked (scallops) as the cook everything together. No the best way to cook — the shrimp and scallops are small and the pieces of vegetables are large.
2^nd time we found roaches coming out of the bench seating — the manager comp’ed the dinner and a bus boy came by to stomp on the roach.
3^rd time — why did i go??? Again over cooked meat — messy hostess stand and generally disorganized.
For my money, there are many «buffets» that offer Mongolian style cooking as part of the buffet. Just not worth the money.

Very interesting dining concept: You go through a line and pile as much vegetables and meat onto this tiny bowl (some people have perfected the art of stacking up to 12 or more inches high) and then you get to pick your sauces. You then give this to the people at the grill, choose your carb (rice, udon, etc) and they will grill it up with your sauces and bring it to your table.
In my experience, the food shrinks a LOT by the time it gets to you (so make sure you stack as much as possible) and they give you much fewer noodles/​rice than what would be adequate to have even proportions between carbs and protein. The sauces you pick taste great, but the flavour doesn’t transfer over into the cooking, so make sure you get MULTIPLE small bowls of the sauces, at the minimum 2 so that some of the flavour carries over.
Only three stars because the food was mediocre, but I may try again and change how I stack the food and sauces to get a better end result.
Wait staff is great.

It was actually very good and deserves every bit of three stars but I withheld one star because it’s not AYCE. Every Mongolian BBQ I’ve ever been to was AYCE except for this one. However, I was completely full after only one bowl so maybe I should give back the star. Olay 3 star rating.
The service was good considering we walked in an hour prior to closing. They had a huge selection of proteins, veggies, dry and wet seasonings. I prefer my meat sliced thin on these buffets but to each his own. The large chunks were fine. Everything tasted good.

This place is super inexpensive for Asian but reminds me of lean cuisine style Asian food. The service was horrendous. I cant finish my meal it’s not disgusting its just generic. I do wish I went somewhere else I don’t plan to come back. It’s probably best for people with children because its easy and very American. I’d say you’re better off at wok n Asian grill a mile down the street. I wish that it was less pre packaged sauces as well, they’re the same sauces as the ones in Walmart. It’s a bad knock off of stir crazy. I don’t recommend for people who enjoy real Asian cuisine.

Not bad. My kids really enjoyed eating here and we were more than full when finished. A very neat idea. Service was fine and the bathrooms clean.

Really liked it!
Went during lunch and like most people have said, how good your food tastes is really up to you!
As the other reviews have said, grab a bowl and get to the food bar (your server will be happy to explain everything and show you the setup). If you are not a good cook but your friend or significant other is, have them make your bowl for you. If you know nothing about cooking, do not expect a great tasting bowl to materialize! This is all about knowing what flavors go together and how to properly season your food.
The meat bar was orderly when we went and did not look unsanitary which is what I was afraid of; there is a large selection of different types of meats and even some tofu if you’re looking to mix it up a bit. The veggie selection is also huge and you can even grab a whole egg for the cooks to incorporate into your dish. Awesome!
Get some seasoning on your meat, but be careful not to over season and be mindful of seasonings that already have salt in them (also keep in mind that your sauce will probably be salty as well). Remember; you can fix under seasoning with a little salt at the table but you can’t fix over seasoning.
Pick your sauce and then head over to the cooks and select your grain. Brown rice is no extra charge here (can everyone stop charging extra for brown rice, now?) which is a big plus.
I would recommend washing your hands after making your bowl b/​c you are doing something where people are handling raw meat… you don’t know if there could be some contamination on the serving ware, so better to be safe than sorry.
The only thing I didn’t like was the sauce selection. I’m not saying that they weren’t good but they all kind of tasted the same to me. All had a thick molasses tasting base, which was good, but I would like a little variety. Maybe some coconut curry or some soy based sauces?
Will def be back!

I don’t think I have ever seen so many «Useful» reviews for a Gainesville restaurant. Too bad this was one of those cases where I didn’t read them thoroughly enough to grasp the importance. I feel like the review page for Genghis Grill should just include a gigantic list of hints and tips instead of any reviews on the actual food. Don’t get me wrong, the food quality is worth noting (get to that soon), but there are other more important aspects of the meal that I really wish I would have paid more attention to. Here are the things I take away the most, and will use next time I’m here.
–Veggies before meat, so you can fit more overall volume.
–Know your food combos, spices, and sauces. Besides food quality, this is what makes or breaks your meal.
–Use zucchini or another veggie around the sides of the bowl to create a wall and stack the contents higher.
I filled my bowl to what looked like a «normal» amount and after it was cooked, it looked rather small. I don’t know why I was surprised, I’ve been to these types of Mongolian grills before and should have known better. Anyway, I still got full because I’m not a huge eater, but for $ 10/​person I think it’s much better to stuff that bowl as full as possible. The quality of the food, and the atmosphere, was good as well. I don’t know why I expected it to be a dump here but the interior is nice. And the marinated steak was tender and had good flavor… surprising considering the typical low quality of «steak» when you aren’t at an actual steakhouse.
Lastly, I don’t know if this is included on every receipt, but ours had a survey opportunity for buy one get one free bowl. Survey literally takes one minute to fill out online and you will get an instant coupon in your email when completed. I was a little meh about the $ 10 per bowl dinner, but at $ 5 per bowl it would be a steal, especially when following the hints… er, I mean reviews.

First of all: You need to have a plan of attack when composing your meal. YES, there is a technique, and more than one.
Do you want to «feast like a beast»? If yes, follow the below plan.
1) add some veggies first. I suggest a bit of broccoli or peas (spinach shrivels and disappears when grilled and only takes up volume.
2) pack in your desired meats
3) insert baby corns along the perimeter of your bowl (this serves as a barrier which increases the circumference of the bowl to add more ingredients — think of them like spikes)
also, try inserting broccoli in between each baby corn to reinforce your wall.
4) wall completed, add more meat
Second: You must understand what type of seasonings you like. You make or break the success of your meal. Mix and match a couple teaspoons. (Dragon salt, Curry salt, Pepper)
Third: The suggested sauces are on par w/​the descriptions. Experiment.
Remember: Stick to meats you like. The marinated fish looks suspect to me so I don’t mess with it. Chicken, steak, sausage, shrimp are all clutch.

What can I say? Genghis Grill did not fail to meet my expectations. It was about 12 noon on GameDay and I was hungry for some lunch so I decided to pay this place a visit. The interior had some people inside but it wasn’t crazy packed by any means. Everyone was probably saving themselves for the big game that night.
The inside looked nice and clean and I asked to be seated outside since it was such a nice day outside. I sat down and my server (who I think was named Daniel) brought me a small silver bowl and asked me if I’ve ever been there before. I told him no and he urged me to follow him and he would explain how everything works. It is all written down on the menu how to go about getting your food but it was good service to have my server offer to show me the process. There is a protein bar, seasoning bar, vegetable bar and a sauce bar. The protein bar has a variety of raw meats like steak, chicken, pork, scallops, squid, etc. I was told that I could pile the bowl as high as I wanted to with items in the various bars and that I could mix and match whatever I wanted to. I decided to go with the Steak, and scallops… threw some garlic powder and lots of red pepper on there… mongolian peppers… snow peas… and a variety of other greens. My bowl was packed pretty high and I decided to add a sauce I found to my liking (G3? 3G? Something with a G! lol) and I walked over to the huge grill and gave them my overflowing bowl of food and picked Udon Noodles as the starch to add to my bowl.
They issued me a number and I went back outside. Id say about 10 minutes later they came outside and brought me my food piping hot. There were really no surprises with what I got because I literally had a direct hand in what my food would end up tasting like by seasoning the meat and picking the sauce. The steak wasn’t overcooked and the scallops were good. It wasn’t overwhelmingly good but it was good. I was pleased with my selection and there was plenty to eat in that bowl. The lunch special is $ 8.99 and for $ 2 extra dollars you can go back for more and make it a «bottomless bowl». All in all I think what drives this business is the novelty of it all. In a small college town where students are into trying new and appealing things outside of your average Chili’s and Fridays, this place brings a fresh new option to the mix of restaurants that have been here. In Gainesville its sink or swim with new businesses always trying to open up… This place swam simply because… its a novelty.