Pho Waves Restaurant — Restaurant in Buffalo

DON'T BELIEVE THE HYPE! Worst Asian food in WNY, by far. I eat at Asian spots 3-4 times a week and this was the lowest quality food & experience I've had ever. We were incredibly excited for an all you can eat Asian style place to come to Buffalo and this ain't it chief. We purposely came on Tuesday instead of the weekend so it would not be super busy, that turned out to be a mistake because not one thing was fresh. I understand this is all you can eat so the food is not going to be the best but the quality should not be this low, it was far below average.

Every single dish we had was low quality and you can tell it had been sitting out for a good amount of time. The roast pork buns were disgusting and gummy. I couldn't even finish and I've never left a pork bun uneaten in my life. The dumplings you can tell were fried much earlier and had been sitting in a warmer or something. The spring roll was terrible. The rice paper on the outside was hard and chewy. Please do not get me started on the PAPAYA SALAD & CONGEE. Both these dishes were stomach churning. I am not trying to be dramatic. Believe me when I tell you these were the worst versions of these dishes I've ever ate by ten fold or more. The nigiri was visibly very shiny and low quality, super chewy, even the white tuna which normally melts in your mouth. We ordered the Wasabi Chicken and they came out with the lemongrass chicken instead for some reason. The ramen eggs were super salty. The beef short rib was average but super small portion. The shrimp tempura was not tempura battered at all and was super dense and soggy. Red Curry had average flavor but the veggies and shrimp were super saturated like they had been soaking in the curry sauce for hours. The grilled salmon wasn't bad until it almost KILLED my date. She bit into her last piece and a super sharp spine ended up in her mouth. It cut her cheek but if this would have got into her throat could have turned out very bad for all parties involved. I was going to rate this place two stars until that happened. Very careless preparation. From our seats you could look into the kitchen and see the workers just standing around talking. Seems like all the food is already precooked HOURS before and just served quickly when ordered. There should be a kitchen manager tasting the food to see if it was sitting out too long. My date and I's stomach were very bubbly for the rest of the night.

Okay let's finally get to the good things! (Not many) The server Jasmine was very respectful and friendly. The tall black bald server/bus boy was really nice and charismatic (did not catch his name.) The beer and mixed cocktails from the bar were very good. Lastly, the dessert was the best part of the meal and the highest quality dish we were served.

I can not tell you how disappointed I am by this place. I was so excited but it is just another over hyped, low quality food place on Chippewa. Spend your money elsewhere. Even though it is all you can eat for $29 it would be much wiser to go elsewhere and spend that money. 110%...

Upon arriving during lunch hour on a Friday I see just two other customers in the restaurant. I'm promptly seated to my table and offered the menu. I look at my table and it's decorated with the ocean and a giant sea turtle. What I might expect at Sea World or a seafood restaurant, not a restaurant specializing in Vietnamese Pho. The waiter was attentive and capable. I ordered the $12 lunch special of Chicken and Avocado Salad. (pictures included) The salad was delicious despite bathing in salad dressing. It was soaking in it. Perhaps lightly dressing the salad in the kitchen and providing the customer with the remaining dressing on the side would be a better option?

Now, more on ambience. It's 1pm and I'm trying to enjoy a relaxing lunch. But Miami Beach Spring Break-esque hip-hop and rap thud-thud-thud throughout the restaurant. Maybe a favorite of the kitchen workers but not a favorite of mine Or was like we were gearing up for the cluuub. There's much better ambient music chooses for a professional dining experience.

Just because of the thump-thump-thumps while I'm trying to eat I probably wouldn't return. It was fine if it were happy hour at the bar or club but not at 1pm on a lunch hour workday. The restaurant decor and menu seems to go everywhere without a clear main focus. I thought I was going to a Vietnamese restaurant for Pho but they had entries on the menu claiming to be Japanese and Thai. My chicken salad was basic California Chicken atop a bed of greens garnished with avocado with a non-descript salad dressing that the chef couldn't tell the food server anything but "avocado and Thai dressing." What does that mean? I saw no avocado cream in the dressing. It...

DON'T GET SCAMMED BY THE "LUNCH SPECIALS." Went out to lunch with my family. The menu CLEARLY STATES that there is a special on Tuesdays for $3 off each roll, and a salmon sushi bowl on sale for $10 when it is normally $13. Not ONCE were we told that they were not running those specials anymore until AFTER WE PAID. It is on EVERY SINGLE MENU, even the take out menus. They did NOT give me a print out of the bill before having me pay because they use a handheld card reader that only shows you the total. Once the receipt was printed, we brought up the discrepancies to the waitress. She went to her boss and he denied the price adjustment, and only said "we don't do that anymore" and they "haven't updated the menus yet." If something is on your menu, honor it! I have never been more enraged at a restaurant in my life. If it was only a few dollars, fine, but this was a total discount of what would have been $12 off my bill. That's the cost of an entire specialty sushi roll. Do NOT go here for lunch they will rip you off with a bait and switch. They also put our food into the kitchen in a very weird order. We ordered an appetizer, one of us ordered a bento box, one of us ordered the sushi bowl, and another got 3 rolls of sushi. The sushi bowl and the miso soup from the box came out first. About 8 minutes later, the bento box comes out. Another 5 minutes later, the pork buns arrive. Finally, last, the three sushi rolls come out. The waitress must have been new or something. It's not her fault about any of this she is new, but you have to train your people...