A few weeks ago I was chosen as a Taste Maker for
Cardiff's Red Hot World Buffet. What this means is that I will be attending events and courses at the restaurant for them, and reviewing my visits there. So this is my first post as a Red Hot Taste Maker. I have visited the venue about 5 times in the past and once for an event. So I know the general quality of food and what is usually on offer.
I went with the hubby on a week day lunch time after we had a meeting in Cardiff for a photo job. It is really great when you want a relatively quick lunch and are with a group of people or a fussy eater. I will eat most things, but Jon can sometimes be a bit fussy, so at least we know at Red Hot that we will both be able to find something we like, and something we fancy eating. With a huge selection of cuisine from Chinese, Italian and indian to British, American and Japanese you can pick and chose what you want, and can have a little bit of everything if you fancy it!
The service was very good. We had booked before hand (which I would always advise at any buffet type place) so were seated very quickly, on this lunch time it was fairly steady as the downstairs was almost full so we were seated upstairs. The staff are very attentive for clearing finished plates and refreshing drinks.
Here is what we had:
Jon isn't into the starters type things so goes straight for some Chinese and curry! At lunch time there is usually 2-3 different curry's along with 3-5 Chinese dishes, as well as all the side dishes. They are usually all pretty fresh and kept nice and warm in their lidded heated containers.
I like to mix it up a little! I adore Sushi so always make sure I get some, during lunch hour they usually have a few different California roll type ones! Then some really quite tasty goats cheese, spinach and tomato pizza, granted the pizza isn't always hot as it depends how long it had been out of the oven, but the pizza's are always tasty! Then I had a few salady bits!
This was the first time I tried the stir-fry station as in the past it has been busy in the evenings and I have been impatient, but during the day it is much quieter so I jumped in to try it out. You get your choice of noodles, meat, veggies and sauce, then you hand it over to the station chef and he whips it up into a tasty fresh stirfry, it was yummy!! I had egg noodles, chicken strips, loads of mushrooms, bean sprouts, peppers and bamboo shoots with sweet and sour sauce! And it only took a few minutes!
I also had some breaded scallops, crab claw, spring roll and prawn crackers. Mini Chinese feast!
Jon loves his desert so this is Carrot Cake, Passion Fruit Cheesecake and a strawberry mousse/sponge thing. The dessert counter is great fun, with lots of small portions of different desserts.
I went with a mini chocolate mud pie (sadly the centre wasn't runny like it should have been), a walnut brownie and some toffee icecream with butterscotch sauce, their icecreams are really creamy and so yummy! Now if I am being picky this would be my one down point, I went to the ice-cream counter at 1:45pm, so not even half way through their lunch hour as their last sitting can be booked at 3:30, and asked for the mint choc chip ice cream (my fav) which was in the counter, only to be told they didn't have any!?!? When I said it was right there and pointed at it he told me there wasn't any left for the lunch time sitting! If it is right there in the freezer and is only 1:45 hours into a 4:30 hour lunch time sitting I should have been able to have it, either don't put it in the freezer, or put on more for your lunch sitting. But that was my only real down point.
The selection of food during the lunch sitting is about half of what you would get in the evening, but as lunch is £8.49 during the week compared to £13.99 during the evening, it is to be expected and pretty typical of buffet style restaurants. The food itself is always tasty, it may not be top quality, but is really good for the price point and for this style of restaurant.
So there you have my first review as a Red Hot Taste Maker. Has anyone else been to a Red Hot Buffet somewhere else in the country? What do you think of it? Actually what do people think of buffet restaurants in general?
