Elephante Tried China Buffet in North Seattle
It's simple pleasures that make the heart glad. I once asked a local cook where he took his family to eat. He said he had class, he took them to the buffet.
Keeping my family's New Year's tradition, which is dine in or carryout Asian Cuisine, I tapped out trying to find a Tea Garden, like the one in the town I grew up in.
Yes, to the Tea Garden of a suburb in eastern Kansas, do I measure every buffet serving Asian style cuisine. And it's hard to measure up. The Tea Garden has an aura, an umatched “good spirit” that plays a role in making savory auromas that draw you in from parked car to tastefully decorated breezeway.
The buffet, an all day catering gig that serves walk ins interested in the hits on the menu, allures most hungry guests with the phrase, “All you can eat”. Since I can remember, there were good ones and there were great ones, some I'd dodge for my life.Those thoughts in mind, I surveyed Google for prospects.
The China Buffet, just north of Seattle, stuck out because frankly, the pictures of it's food looked better in comparison to others resulting from my search. My first question was, can I order off the menu? Only for carryout.
Yes, the Tea Garden is full service. Menu, buffet, and carryout. Really, really yum.
The China Buffet is ridiculously inexpensive. The greatness of the buffet genius is that it offers a dish for just about every taste. Buying in bulk and low overhead isn't the only thing that keeps a buffet like this one in business. The food must be good.
I didn't get to try everything, but I tried. The little twice baked, new potato was delicious. A sugar covered doughnut, labeled as a “house roll” on the buffet, was classically good. I have a thing for garlic mushrooms, and their’s hit the spot, so to speak. But where the China Buffet goes toe to toe with the Tea Garden, is to me, the most crucial aspect of the whole buffet.
Crab Rangoon. Crispy, savory cream filled pastries that contend with the greatest culinary inventions ever. While Tea Garden offers a good version of the crunchy appetizer, China Buffet has mastered creamy crab filling, hands down.
I like them a little more golden, slightly crispier, but I couldn't ask for a better filling.
As for the atmosphere, I felt at home. Free hot tea, lovely. Mongolian BBQ line, fun, the cook manning the station did cute tricks for the kids. A bit of a puzzle, the Chinese Zodiac printed on paper placemats on every table (reminds me of the old school restaurants I enjoyed growing up) were fun to look at and match your year of birth to your animal. Mine is the rat, same as Harry's, although I feel he resembles one more than I do.
The Elephante, my chef spirit, always on the cusp of brooding critism and raging objectivity, wasn't too angry. I felt the selection was pretty good, scaled back from the nearly lavish Sakura Seafood Buffet in College Park, Maryland, far cries from Chinatown, New York. Budget friendly, I say you get your money's worth at the China Buffet.