Beechmont Avenue can completely overwhelm you with restaurant choices -- by the time I found Dragon City (8315 Beechmont Ave., Anderson Twp., 513-388-9913), I'd passed at least three other Chinese restaurants and wondered if this one would be any different.
If you avoid buffets because you don't like food that's been sitting around awhile, Dragon City has two good options. There's a sushi bar with a very friendly young chef who has several selections prepared. The night I was there they were California rolls and cucumber rolls. As I watched, I noticed two customers approach and special order sushi which the chef made while they watched. I requested two pieces of eel and two of sweet shrimp, and they were delightful.
There's also a "Mongolian Bar-B-Que." I wasn't sure about the procedure, but the same chef who'd made the sushi directed me on this, too. We picked, from a variety of ingredients, some noodles, red and green peppers, scallions and thinly sliced beef, which he tossed around on a hot oiled grill. He asked me if I wanted hot pepper sauce and garlic, and I agreed to both. The resulting stir-fry was fresh and delicious.
Though I wasn't as crazy about the buffet choices, the selection was huge! Six two-sided islands with an incredible assortment of food, in no particular order. Iced raw oysters, crab legs and shrimp, cherry cobbler, General Tso's chicken and beef with broccoli plus pizza, stuffed baked clams and macaroni and cheese. It's enough choices to appease fussy eaters or even those with multiple personalities.
Dragon City did a fair job on the standard choices. The Singapore Mai Fun was nice and eggy, and the Szechuan string beans were crisp and fresh.
I tried a few disappointing appetizers. The spring rolls and the egg rolls had the same filling -- basic cabbage. The Crab Rangoon had neither crab nor rangoon (whatever that is). Just fried wrapping, as far as I could tell. A better choice would be the fresh fruit that was up at the front table.
After I fought with a crab leg for about 10 minutes, I noticed a basket of shellfish tools on my next trip back to the buffet. That's a metaphor for Dragon City dining: Scope it all out first, carefully. On your trip home past Beechmont's hundreds of other restaurants, you'll know you chose wisely. (Dinner Buffet: Sunday-Thursday $8.75, Friday-Saturday $9.75; Lunch Buffet, $5.25) -- ANNE MITCHELL
Walking into The Grand Buffet (3320 Highland Ave., Pleasant Ridge, 513-351-3288) the first impression I get is that if Denny's were to open a restaurant in China, this is how it would look. Formica, naugahyde, plastic flowers and stacked infant chairs intermingled with Asian trinkets instead of star-spangled kitsch, and scenic Chinese murals on the walls instead of liquidation art. Maybe that's because this building was a Denny's before it morphed into the Grand Buffet and, although the food is mostly middle-of-the-road Chinese, there is clearly a portion that recognizes its former life.
Grand Buffet advertises over 90 available items. You can probably order something you don't see, but the five buffet islands offer about 50 of those on any given day, with many of those in rotation so you could conceivably try something new every day for a month.
The first time I visited, I really enjoyed the available selections, and the freshness was impressive for a mid-afternoon. I couldn't get enough of the Tofu with Peppers and Onions in Spicy Sauce that -- even though it looked to be a common sauce in several other dishes -- was so deliciously dark and piquant. I loved the perfectly snappy Green Beans in Garlic Sauce as well as the Szechuan Broccoli, and was positively giddy about the variety and amount of fresh fruit. I wasn't crazy for the fried items such as wontons and egg rolls, which occupy an entire island (they all tasted similar), nor the sweets which were pure sugar and little flavor.
By my second visit -- and then the third hoping the second was an anomaly -- things slid downhill a bit. Except for my beloved tofu, some pan-fried potatoes and the fruit, there were no other vegetarian items. That's OK: I'm used to meat being a more popular item, but my carnivorous companions on the two subsequent visits were ambivalent about some of the choices, and even laughed outright at the quality of the sushi.
Given the décor, I shouldn't have been surprised by the amount of Midwestern food such as chicken wings, potatoes, sautéed apples, pork chops and so on, but looking around the crowded dining room I noticed that these were popular choices with many of the customers.
As long as they keep consistent quality, Grand Buffet has a little something for everyone, and lots of it. (Dinner Buffet and all-day Sunday: $8.45; Lunch Buffet: $5.25) -- DONNA COVRETT
Printer-friendly version
