Empire Buffet — Restaurant in Greenville

Save yourself the disappointment. Don't go here. I made the mistake of dining at this establishment once and never will again.

First, once I got through the first set of double doors there was another set of double doors with a sign threatening to charge you for wasted food (food you don't eat). It didn't dawn on me that there might be a reason why customers waste so much food that the restaurant has to charge for it.

Second, I go to Chinese buffets not only for the all you can eat aspect but also because of the never ending supply of sushi. Now it's a Chinese buffet so my expectations are lowered. Luckily for me I noticed the notes on the sneeze guard that denotes the time each batch was made or put out. Most of the times for the raw foods (sushi, shrimp, mussels) was between 1300 and 1330. I arrived at the restaurant at about 1800. That's a long time for raw protein to be just sitting out.

Third, since I dare not eat the sushi or other raw seafood there I tried food from the other two islands. Notice how I didn't say hot foods. The reason for that is that half of the food I put on my plate was room temp at best. Not a pleasant surprise.

On the plus side, their sweet tea isn't bad. I did order an Arnold Palmer (sweet tea and lemonade...

We used to eat there before the pandemic so we were happy to see they reopened. My Husband and I went in at 12 for lunch today. The buffet was missing most food, the food that was there had obviously been sitting under heat lights or on the buffet. It tasted horrible. We weren’t there more then 5 min. We took just a couple of bites of food off our plates and new it was a bad idea to eat there. The chicken tasted as if it had been freezer burnt or gone bad. 3 different chicken dishes tasted this way on top of the meat being almost rubbery in texture. We immediately told the lady working the cashier we did not want to continue our meal and asked for our money back. She tried to say we had been in earlier in the week and it had been fine. We hadn’t been there in over a year. Then she refused to give us a full refund and made us pay for our drinks that were still full on the table but did allow us to get Togo cups. I would NOT recommend this place to anyone. The lady said she does not cook the food someone comes in the am and cooks it meaning all the food they're putting out is just heated up or redropped in the grease. DO...

Honestly from the appearance alone I was doubting the quality and taste of this establishment. But to my surprise the food is very well made and taste good! Nothing amazing but the chief definitely knows what he or she is doing back there😁👍. I'm not from around here(252) so it was very unusual for them to have me pay before I was even SEATED! But once I got past that and how compact the place was,I found a neat and clean restaurant with as I said before very well cool food. I ate my usuals like fried chicken,lo mein,beef and broccoli,sweet n sour chicken, sesame chicken(with no sesame seeds🤷) and green beans. Like I said before don't let the appearance fool you because the parking lot was full of work vans and trucks as well as the establishment had several working on lunch break grabing Togo boxes. It's a high quality Chinese buffet no more no less. If your looking for WOW this not it but if your hungry trying to get through the rest of your work day I would definitely recommend. Oh yeah by the way the hibachi grill is...