Riverside Mongolian Grill — Restaurant in Puyallup

Well, that was mildly confusing as a first time visit! No employees were near the door when I entered and no clear signs of the correct customer flow. After picking up one of the paper menus by the door and looking inside it, I found a printed diagram of customer instructions and the price to expect. Thinking I might need to pay first, though, I decided to stop the woman who was cleaning tables. I proactively told her this was my first time there and asked her what I should do. As the printed instructions had told me, she pointed me to the very back of the restaurant and told me to go ahead and fill up a bowl. No employees were at the buffet line and no employees were stationed at the cash register the entire time I was there. I followed the crowd of other guests thru the buffet line and up to the cooking counter. After the guests in front of me had their food taken to be cooked, I was then skipped over and the guests who arrived behind me had their food taken to be cooked. I saw another guest have her food put in a to-go box; so once a cook did finally take my bowl of food I told them I wanted the same thing. I was then told I had done everything all completely wrong and that someone at some point was supposed to have handed me a bigger, special colored bowl so that I could receive more food for the price paid. In defense of myself, I told the cook I had just been following the only instructions I had been given. The cook called over to the woman cleaning to inform her I had done everything completely wrong as a guest by having followed their only instructions. The woman who was cleaning looked over without any clear expression on her face other than possibly mild confusion and resumed cleaning without comment to me. I was then asked by the cook if this was my first serving. Yes. I was asked by the cook if anyone else's food was supposed to be packaged with mine. No. I was then told by the cook to stand in a specific place at the far end of the counter. Very soon after I walked to that place the same cook told me to turn around, leave the counter, and go pay. No other guests having their food cooked alongside mine were paying just then. So I interrupted the woman from her cleaning again, told her the cook had sent me to her, and I asked her to ring up my meal. She stopped what she had been doing in order to do so. Dine-in guests were being given free fortune cookies with their bills but I guess to-go order don't get the same, since none were offered to me. The other to-go guests had received bags in which to carry their meals, but I guess by having done everything completely wrong I didn't warrant one. That's okay, since it was more environmentally friendly by not having gotten a bag. The "free" pot stickers, egg rolls, ice cream, etc other Google reviewers mention are also very clearly marked in multiple places inside the restaurant as reserved only for dine-in guests. As far as I could tell from the paper menus at the door, though, take-out guests pay the exact same price despite receiving less than dine-in guests. When I walked back to the cooking counter after paying, I was given my food, was politely asked if I wanted rice, was given a plastic fork along with a dirty paper napkin, and then I left. The food tasted fine and was of normal quality. There wasn't anything special about the experience to entice me to return there...

With high expectations from previous Mongolian grill experiences in other places at different establishments, my spouse and I gave Riverside Mongolian Grill a try. Unfortunately, the experience and the meal were astonishingly mundane and mediocre.

Investigating the restaurant's website, we were enticed. However, upon callling to order a "Build Your Own Wok" meal, we discovered that we could only place a "to go" "pickup" order through the website, not personally with the proprietor. As that involved providing a credit card rather than paying cash upon picking it up, we opted to go to the restaurant, order there, and take it home.

Upon arrival, we discovered that the option avaiable online was not available within the location. One may only "Build Your Own" for lunch or for dinner - with no sides of gyoza or egg soup - and do so for dinner at a price a buck higher than presented online.

Willingly, we acquired a bowl and assembled our meal, addiing various ingredients before taking it to the grill for cooking. Most of the vegetables were less than fresh and the available meats were shaved and indistinguishable from one another.

Both enjoying hot and sour soup, we acquired a side order of that, too, to see how it stood up to other soup experiences.

Upon arriving home, with a laden styroform container of our grill, we served ourselves, sat down and started to eat: astonishingly mundane and mediocre.

In terms of freshness, taste, that classic Mongolian grill medley, and aroma, there was not zazz, no pop, no mouth watering yumminess. Just blah. And the hot and sour soup permitted two soupfuls before we both rejected it as unedible and threw it away; four more misspent dollars.

Puyallup offers wonderful dining choices. Disappointingly, Riverside Mongolian Grill is not among them. What you do with your hard earned dollars is your choice, but from this one-time only customer, something so misrepresented, so unappetizing, so mediocre will never get us to return. And a single $, at twenty bucks a bowl? It costs $$ and isn't worth half a dollar rating. Riverside Mongolian Grill is mundane, mediocre, and very...

I had delivered from here several times for doordash and it had made me and my fiance very excited to try it. We had tried to eat the other day but they were closed due to maintenance so we came here today instead. Big mistake. After entering we were pointed to take a seat at a table by one of the two ladies working tonight. We took a seat and waited since we had never actually gotten to eat here yet. Me and my fiance had been speaking for several minutes before one of the ladies came in and asked if we would be eating we confirmed that we had but had never eaten here before. She seemed frustrated asked what we wanted to drink and explained the rules Ingredients were in the back and there were spring rolls/gyoza as well as soup and that was it. We got our food and had it cooked both of the cooks seemed exhausted or frustrated my fiances cook was more pleasant but mine only really asked if I wanted rice. Our drinks were filled to the brim with ice and very little soda so we drank them pretty quick. Before we got a second plate my fiance asked about refill for our drinks and they refilled them while we got our second plate. Mine ended up being burnt. After finishing our plate my fiance once again had to ask about a refill only to be told they only do 1 refill. Given the horrible service, my fiance later telling me even their toilets didn't seem to be installed properly since they moved around while he was sitting on it. Only getting 1 refill, and burning the food I feel 1 star is being gracious would give 0 if I could 50+ dollars for 2 people is ridiculous for the quality, service and amount. Definitely will not...