B&D Halal Food — Restaurant in New York

I finally tried this place and my first experience was very good, I will definitely come back now more often. They price by weight.

Note: There are actually two different halal African food buffets that are few blocks away from each other. This one on 30th St and another one around 27th or 28th st that is an avenue away.

This was on 30th Street, it's definitely newer looking, more aesthetically appealing to the surrounding Mzungu sense of contemporary modern mass chow-hall decor, yeah, you know the one, it having the common grey frigid sterile concrete walls but also the warmly new wooden seats that are up against the wall perfectly facing towards the buffet and the brand new ubiquitous large scale HDTv sets hovering right above, penetrating the line of sight with every bite.

This location is right across the current Renzo's Gracie Jujitsu academy. Come during the day for a fresher and wider selection just like the other location which I believe was around much more longer. I'm not sure if they're run by the same owners. I went late at night to both of them on different occasions not expecting much options left but happily proven my assumption wrong when I got there though the proteins selections were already running low when I arrived but during my meal, I did see the kitchen were re-stocking some items and were kind enough to check up on people and the buffet.

It would have been helpful if they had a little English description for noobs unfamiliar with the items. I just took a little sample of everything.

On late Friday night, this place surprisingly had a steady amount of foot traffic too, mainly from all the very polite and modest temperament almost invisible hard-working class drivers, bicycle delivery persons, so many of whom being of Muslims backgrounds and all observing their strict halal dietary restrictions in this city can be tricky to navigate so I'm sure finding a place like this down here can be so much of a relief for them in between picking up cue, especially a place that can also happily accommodate most budgets, giving them a little piece of culture from back home, familiar faces, not feeling strange or out of place and yes, a little bit of community while waiting on pings from the apps.

That entire ave. used to be cold and frigid few years back with barely any foot traffic at night time, it could easily feel very unsafe back then but alhumdullilah, there were a whole bunch of actual free parking available for those ebikes and spaces nearly all filled up. Guess where is...

Uodate update: I’ve eaten here a few more times. Last week the food was amazing. Moist chicken and great flavor. Today it was atrocious and I went at prime lunch time. The chicken was tough and dry and bad flavor. I told the cashier and asked if I could take a little more of something else and she said I don’t know. I then asked for the manager and she said only comes Mondays. So essentially nobody can make a decision like that outside of Mondays. Screw this place and their wildly inconsistent food. Changing to one star Update: B&D is very inconsistent. Sometimes it’s amazing as per my original review. Then there are days like today where the food is not fresh, lacks flavor, and makes me sick. Todays meal was atrocious. The chicken I got literally tasted like black pepper. Too much black pepper. Complete garbage. Also other chicken dishes there today were way over cooked so I didn’t take those. Extremely dark and felt hard. Sometimes they overcook the chicken to the point it’s like a rock. Who wants to eat that? But todays meal is what made me edit my review from a 5 to 3, it was so bad and I feel sick right now. Awful stomach ache. And another thing that’s annoying at B&D is the atmosphere. People post up there for hours taking up tables and many tables are left messy. I will keep going back because food in this area is pretty weak but now I’ll have to hope and pray it doesn’t make me sick. Or they can read this review and improve

Original review: The food is really really good here. I have been working in midtown for the last few months and stumbled upon B&D. Now I go about 3-4 times per week for lunch. Everything is always fresh, nothing frozen or 1-2 days old. The meats are always very tender and tasty. The lamb is especially good, so much flavor. I also really like their rice with beef, I think it is called Joloff. And they have a nice salad bar area with avocado. Make sure to grab one of the juices. They have ginger juice and a purple one made from roselle. Everything is pretty cheap too. Its like $8 per pound so I usually spend $10-13 for a nice sized lunch. Oh and lastly the staff are super friendly. The cashiers are always happy and positive, you feel like youre not in NYC...

This place is brilliant!! I was here for a casual lunch with a friend on the weekends and their food trays were filled with fresh food and none of them looked empty/sad. It has everything, rice&beans, chicken, fish, salad section, fruits, and of course all the African specialties as well.

It’s buffet style, which I love because then I can try a bit of everything and they charge you based on the weight at the end. Today I got some fish, chicken gizzards, pig feet, fried chicken, avocados, rice and of course some veggies. So yummy!! It came out to be around $10 for me but I imagine someone with a bigger stomach might spend closer to $15 but it’s very affordable for midtown NYC.

There’s also a drinks section where you can make tea/coffee...