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| - I love a buffet. I can even be a fan of a bad buffet if it's not TOO bad (like a Golden Corral.) In fact, I think Cici's Pizza was the only buffet I ever cringed at, but for $5, even that didn't totally dissuade me. But a GOOD buffet can grab my attention as a destination - and Misaki grabbed me attention.
Housed in what used to be a Tambellini's, it's actually kind of humorous to enter on first glance. Nothing like Sushi and Sashimi, surrounded by old-world Italian family restaurant elegance. And the overall atmosphere IS just that. But with much better food than Tambellini's had to offer.
I was treating my neighbor for his birthday and as a thank you for all of the help they'd given me while I was out of work, and this definitely scored well on that scale.
The food options are plentiful, and quite delicious. They have four or five lines of buffet tables, with everything from Japanese hot dishes (chicken & broccoli, etc.) to the Hibachi grill (grab your own ingredients and watch the Asian hottie fry it up for you), the munchies (crab rangoon and various other fried dumpling goodies), the salad and desserts, soups, and the sushi station.
On this night the scrolling light marquee outside boasted of Lobster, but that was the one thing that was a little disappointing. It was kind of chopped into an oblivion, and it seemed rolled in flour which gave it a kind of dusty gummy feel.
As for the sushi, I've never really been a huge fan of it, mostly because I'm not into the balls of rice that accompany every dollop of fresh seafood. Some of the rolls were tasty, and the bits of fish all kind of tasted the same to me. I wouldn't say 'fresh', but nor would I say it tasted like fish that had floated ashore and bloated on the beach. The sushi was just okay.
But the hot dishes, which is really what I go for anyway, were all quite good, and a very large variety. The shumai were quite good, the peel-and-eat shrimp had already been peeled, so I am a HUGE fan now, the pork, chicken and beef dishes were all very flavorful and fresh, and the crab rangoon, well, even if they're bad crab rangoon, I can't pass the table without taking two or three of them, but in this case they were good, so I grabbed quite a few on my three trips to fill up a plate.
On a humorous note, we arrived right around 5:30 pm, and although the food was ready, they hadn't changed all of the descriptor tags that accompanied the items, and when I arrived at one point the tag said 'Special House Chicken' which was positioned over what were clearly frog legs. I had to laugh and thought 'Well, it DOES taste like chicken.' But no NO, you can't fool ME!
As we ate our Asian deliciousness in the old fashioned Italian setting, suddenly the music caught my attention (when I could hear it over the Asian guy sitting behind me who insisted on chewing with his mouth open), and what did I hear? Could it be? Is that Ella? The background music was a gorgeous selection of old jazz, the stuff you used to hear on DUQ before it was swallowed and destroyed by our local visionaries.
It was like the gang from Chinatown beat down the Sopranos, took over their restaurant and moved it to the Cotton Club! Just a delightful little slice of ethnoconfusion...that works.
Now, I do see a few comments here about 'is it worth the price', and my answer would be, absolutely.
Let me see anyone here run out and buy all of the necessary ingredients to create the same all-you-can-eat atmosphere in your own home, from the net full of crabs required for the crab legs, to the sides of beef required for the carving station, the buckets of shrimp, and everything else up and down the steam table line, and I guarantee you - you're going to go WELL over $20. Besides, this isn't an 'everyday' kind of dining thing. This is perfect for those times when you just feel the need to feed, and want things that you can't accomplish at home.
There are other options for this same type of buffet, from Hokkaido to Tokyo, all of which pretty much fall into the same price range, and aren't really all that varying in quality. So hitting them really depends on your mood and location.
But if you're on the South Side of town, and feel like popping through the Liberty Tubes (and hey, isn't it always fun to witness the 'OH MY GOD - IT'S A TUNNEL!' mentality of local drivers?), Misaki really is worth the trip.
The total bill came to just under $40 for two, we were stuffed, and they serve Coke products. They also have a beer and wine list (I didn't notice if they had a full bar set up.)
Misaki - a blend of Ciao Bello, Domoarigato and Yo Brotha, all wrapped up in one neat sushi roll!
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