BD's Mongolian Grill — Restaurant in Lexington

This restaurant is typically my favorite, since it opened … however, today will be my last visit . The only reason i’m even giving ANY stars is because our waitress (and any time i ever come) was prompt and helpful . First we walk in to the host sitting leaned back on his phone and looks disheveled generally . I have a small child which I said up front “3 and a baby” , he walks silently to a table, lays down menus and leaves …. no high chair ….. so our waitress retrieved one which was covered in more food then the floor. It took three wipes to get roughly clean enough (when leaving my child had black scum on her legs from where I probably cleaned it for the first time in its life and loosened all the dirt and grease, awesome). Also let’s add that we had to ask for the table to be wiped down because it too was dirty and sticky like the floors, every chair had food in it and it was NOT busy . 30 mins after opening (1130am) and maybe 5 tables seated …… Then as i’m getting up to the food section, I walk out of my sandal because the floor is so sticky my shoe stuck to it , this was the case the entire path from my table to the grill and back, like they mop with syrup (let’s be real there’s no mopping ever happening here) . The pasta noodles had a hair in it so skipped that and went for just a couple things for the baby because at this point i’m too grossed out to eat . Get to the grill and waited 10 minutes with 3 other guests for the “griller” to arrive from the back . This wait gave me plenty of time to look around where I was further disgusted . The silver plates over the grill are literally dripping (like rain) with grease, the edge/side of the grill hasn’t been cleaned/scraped since the day it opened years ago, cobwebs on top of the grease around the edge of the silver plates and god knows what stuck on the walls and along the counter where my bowl is waiting patiently to be cooked . Once cooked, I take my sticky journey back to my table, start to feed my child . I ask for a knife because of course there isn’t one in the silverware roll, only a fork . Get the knife and it has caked on food , set that aside and then find a hair in the middle of the rice . At this point i’m repulsed, I should’ve said something but I chose not to because I wasn’t going to eat anything they offered after my complaints, I didn’t want to embarrass my elderly parents AND my kid was hungry and stressing me out grabbing everything, I just want to leave to get lunch elsewhere . I get the check only to find for 3 bowls, 2 waters and a sweet tea ….. $60!!!!! wow . that’s expensive for the filth I witnessed . I paid quietly, thanked the waitress for her service and left . I will not be back and had to stop at Culver’s for my kid to be able to eat . Again, im not the kind of person to cause an issue but this was crazy. Do none of the employees look around and see the nastiness???? Where the manager??? I know quality help is hard to find but let’s have some decency in an eating establishment …. Maybe i’ll return to take photos of the filth, it didn’t occur to me at the moment, honestly I couldn’t...

This is a place that is ultimately unique from any experience I've ever had. If you don't choose something off the menu, and you choose to do their signature Bowl: You get a bowl, you go to these buffet style tables and pick your ingredients. Meat & pasta table first, vegetables second, and sauces & spices last. First 2 tables' ingredients go in the bowl, the last one goes into a ramekin provided because the sauce will burn if put on the grill with everything else from the start. Two guys with long sword implements stand by a flat top grill and cook your food, while you wait at a numbered designated place (one of 12) they assign for you. They stir your food with these sword implements. It isn't a great show (that's not why I gave the place 4 stars, I'll explain in a moment why), but it's still fun to watch. You'll know when your food is about to be done when they take the sauce ramekin from your designated place and put it on your food. They will stir it some more, and place it on a plate, then hand you your food, and you can go sit down with it.

The reason I give this marvelous place 4 stars is because if you don't know what you're doing when you choose your ingredients, it could turn out tasting weird. No one tells you how to pair ingredients at this place. If you know how to cook Eastern dishes, you'll be fine. If not, you might end up with a weird concoction. It will Probably taste great, but on the other end of the problem is that there are So Many Choices for toppings. Which is good. But again, if you don't know what pairs well, you could become lost. Common sense goes a long way, but common knowledge is another animal. I find it common sense to add only a little garlic, ginger, or sesame seeds to the ramekin of sauce, because I don't want those flavors to be overpowering the rest of what I've chosen. But it falls under Common knowledge that those ingredients are normally in Eastern sauces. See what I mean?

Fair warning: this place stays busy. And it is a fairly noisy place because of all those people. It's still a great...

This is the worst restaurant experience I've ever had to date. While the whole create your own bowl idea is a great idea being presented to you, very reminiscent of Genghis Grill; the actual experience for me was beyond horrible. I will say that our server was very helpful in telling us how to put everything together. The process was easy enough. By the time we got to the cooking station to present our ingredients to the grill cooks, that's when everything turned very badly for us. The cooks were very unorganized, messy, and also unsanitary with preparing everyone's plates. One cook was very clumsy to the point where half of the ingredients that were given and put on the cooking surface were falling on the floor and/or being contaminated to someone else's order. The service of it all was awful as well. By the time our food was done being prepared and plated we would get our plates slammed down in front of us in a very blunt manner. All of this made my experience very personal; by the time I got my completed first plate, I found that it was pieces of pineapple in my food (something I definitely did not include in my ingredients bowl as I am allergic to pineapple). While the situation was remedied by our server, who directed me to the allergy cooking zone and had my food cooked again with no cross contamination of allergens being present this time; it was not enough to change my opinion of this particular restaurant. So while others may have had great experiences, I highly doubt I will be back to this...