Circa 1925

This is a Buffett. Yet the take «reservations. Meaning you can «make a reservation» to stand in line at 4:45p or 8pm. That’s right STAND IN LINE. so my wife and I were 5 minutes early and were first in line, wahoo! With all tables open, the hostess gave us the worse location, rubbing distance to the busing table AND the tiniest table in the place. A two chair job that embarrassed the server, who was excellent, and helped by removing all standard table items so we could have room for our dinner plates. The food was, well, Buffett food, by that I mean bland. Looks good but is almost tasteless. How do they do it?
Dessert for extra charge was outstanding. Service was excellent. So who blew the rating stars away — the hostess. Hint: don’t give the absolute worse table to your first customer, way too obvious and annoying.

Awesome buffet! Specially the seafood totally exceeded my expectation. All the oyster, snow crab, shrimp, sea scallops, fish were good quality and well prepared. There were also salad, bread, soup, stir fried dishes, meat carving station (turkey, prime rib and others). The only items not included in the buffet price are the drinks and desserts. Tell you the truth, after all the yummy seafood, my stomach ran out of space for meat or dessert. Our waitress diligently brought us sauces, emptied the crab shell, filled our water cups. We were happy that we were the only table in her section (we came at the early bird dinner time). So we received all her attention.
The atmosphere there was not totally modern nor fancy. The dog track view was unique and I saw the greyhounds got brought out by the trainers for their evening walk. They look adorable.
Overall, we enjoyed the dinner very much. I will definitely come back when I am craving for snow crabs!

Feel lucky with nice restaurant, may be can win big while eating. Circa 1925 restaurant located inside the Derby Lane on top of Poker Lounge. It has the theater seating outlook the dog track. I am here for the early bird dinner with great food. The early bird special price has changed since Ben visit. Now is $ 23. The dinner is $ 30 per person. Please make reservations if you come.
I would said if you get sick and tired of Chinese buffet that serve you low grade buffet at dinner, this may be your best choice with good quality material selection. They are constantly monitor the buffet table with no man left behind with empty treys :). The hot side include high grade snow crab, bacon wrap fillet mignon, sea bass scampi, pecan crush salmon, Cajun baked scallops and more. The carve have three choices, I like the most is the prime rib. The cold food has too many. I just want to mention the raw oyster since they are big.
The reason they are 5 stars is due the quality of the buffet, the service to the table, the attentive to the buffet table, and nice derby lane to look at. If you are handicap, they may let you go through the 5 floor access through kitchen to the buffet table level since this is slope theater seat table. It is funny that you are eating and exercising in the same time with the stair to get the food :)

Only 3 reviews?! Foodies are missing out! Great view, huge snowcrab legs… actually cooked right! Calamari, lamb chops, prime rib, and more… very very good food, i was very surprised! As for james T review… i seen a sign that states no children under 10 years old… sorry buddy!

I live off Gandy so this is a convenient and romantic dinner out. The view the staff and food are wonderful. I make a 5:45 reservation on Fridays to save some money on the early bird special.

Something has been bothering me for a while… the low average rating of Circa 1925 restaurant.
Although I have some apprehension with drawing more attention to the wonderful food here, I guess I would have never given it a shot if it hadn’t been for a Unilocal Elite and their own glowing review. Of course, the credibility of the only two reviews seem pretty obvious once you read them, but you might just glaze over this place in search of decent food in the area due to its 3-​ish star average rating. And yes, the website does state no one under 10 allowed (which I’m guessing is for liability reasons due to the staired/​stadium-​style dining area).
As an aside, I’ve pretty much grown up on eating buffets, so I don’t automatically think food is inferior just because it might have been prepared a little beforehand. Sure, there are bad ones, but I can definitely appreciate the value and ability to sample a variety of foods at an AYCE/​buffet-​style restaurant.
But this place is definitely not one of the bad ones.
Ben N. pretty much hit the nail on the head with going during the «early bird» pricing, since you’re getting the same food for $ 7 cheaper AND when it’s at it’s absolute freshest. I guess I’m a little jaded from crab legs being AYCE since the early Chinese buffet days (and I’ll never understand places touting AYCE crab legs for $ 30 – 40 as a «deal»), but these are definitely of great quality and you don’t even have to watch people take full mounds of legs and leaving nothing behind. In fact, I’d say that all of the seafood (scallops, fish, seared tuna, etc.) is consistently prepared very well. The scallop dishes I’ve had here are definitely restaurant quality and you can tell their ingredients are of higher than normal buffet grade.
The only drawbacks are some of the meats are not as consistently rare as I’d like (i.e. overcooked) but food is always replenished in a timely manner, so you can just wait until the next serving. But when it’s cooked properly, it’s really good. The soups and salads are also lacking, and really the only section of the buffet I’d consider subpar.
For dinner, the prime rib is usually the star, while the seared tuna and cocktail shrimp are both really good and available for brunch as well.
One thing to note, however, is that their buffet is only open Fridays and Saturdays; but I think this is why it does so well. They only have 2 days to prepare for instead of trying to account for daily services of varying occupancy. This helps to keep the food consistent and fresh, coupled with their rotating menu that I believe is changed bi-​weekly or so. This is definitely one of my favorite hidden gems in the area, and I’ll definitely be back for more!

The restaurant turned us away for a 5:30 reservation because we had an infant with us (she is two months old) after we drove 35 minutes to get there. The restaurants policy is to not allow children under the age of ten. The manager Debra who had been there for 20+ years told us that it was their policy and that it was a policy made by managers above her. If the restaurant would like to let me know why they have this policy please reply to this post. I would be embarrassed if I had worked for a restaurant for 20 years and was a manager and still had no say in such a ridiculous policy.

TL;DR — Jameis Winston would love it here… AYCE CRAB LEGS!
This place is a certified S.P.E. That stands for Sweat Pants Establishment for those of you who are unaware because not only is it allowed under their dress code, you’re gonna be glad you wore them after you’re done.
On the 6^th floor of this fine gambling establishment in St. Pete, there’s a nice restaurant with a panoramic view of the dog track called Circa 1925 where you can come eat your weight in seafood and steak. They serve everything from baked scallops and prime rib to fresh oysters but what everybody comes here for are the steamed crab legs. It’s so good, that they actually have a 2.5 hour limit per table because I guess some people have taken «All you can eat» too literally. Also be sure to make reservations because it’s been known to get busy.
As far as I know, they’re only open Friday night and all day Saturday but don’t quote me on that because I only come when they have their early bird special for 19.99 from 5−6pm on Saturday (normally 27 bucks which is still a great deal if you’re a seafood fan). It use to be for 15 dollars back in the day but like all good things, they must come to an end. Regardless, definitely a must try for seafood lovers.