Santa Buffet & Grill — Restaurant in Santa Ana

Wanted to try a new buffet for dinner, especially for my mom. She loves buffets! As far as Asian buffets go, this one isn't bad at all. Seating is a little cramped so you have to be ok with having a total stranger sit right next to you, elbow to elbow. Buffet wise, there's a good variety of dishes - crab legs, mussels, crawfish, different shrimp dishes, fried rice, etc, variety of vegetable options, Teppanyaki Grill, soups, salad bar, desserts & even self serve yogurt in vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, mango & some yummy toppings & syrups. They even have a good selection of sushi - not top sushi grade but above other buffets. There was never a shortage of any of the food items. Even the crab legs were fully stocked. I filled up on crab legs, salted shrimp, butterfly shrimp with a flavorful & creamy topping, bok choy, sauteed green beans & mushrooms & swirl yogurt with rainbow sprinkles. Broke my diet but worth it! The rest of my family all tried the Teppanyaki Grill & said it was very well seasoned & grilled perfectly. Not bland like some other buffets. The coke was refreshing & bubbly. Not flat. The service was a little slow @ times with drink refills but overall good. I only gave 4 stars because the bathroom needed attention, the seating was too crowded for my liking & no fortune cookies after the meal. What buffet doesn't have fortune cookies to send the customers off with? Overall, we'll be...

I have visited this restaurant with family and friends a few times, and the food and services were alright. However, the most recent time I visited this place is what made me decide not to come here again. Coming into the restaurant with a couple friends we were immediately asked to pay. I was baffled at first since all the other times we have eaten here, we had to pay after the meal. I figured that they profiled us because we are all young adults. I was baffled, but I understood where they were coming from since most young people have the audacity to dine and dash. We kept an eye out at the reception to see if this was an isolated incident only to find out that we were the only ones that were forced to pay upfront. We all thought it was because we were young. However, later a group of young adult asians came in and they were not forced to pay upfront either. That's when we knew it wasn't only because we were young that we were forced to pay upfront, it was because we were young, and Mexican. They definitely discriminated us because we were young Mexican adults and they assumed we'd dine without paying. On top of that, they only refilled our drinks twice while they usually have a waiter constantly refilling drinks. To sum up, mediocre food with horrible service and discriminating reception. Definitely not...

Reasonably priced good food. They've got kimchi and miso soup, a relative rarity. The pepper chicken and fish are pretty good. Salmon was overcooked and many dishes were dripping with grease. Decent fruit and dessert selection. Ice cream was so oily I spat it back out. The custard bun was rock hard and I gagged on it too. The children were screaming, the lights were half off and it just had the general atmosphere of a trashy rundown place with its best days behind it. Not horribleibly busy but not good, if you're going to goto a buffet, hit up Teppanyaki Supreme for a lower price, Golden Corral for better Western food and Asia Buffet for better Eastern food. The only reason I'd recommend this place is if you loved seafood (nice selection of crab & shrimp) or wanted to save time and bring a large rowdy group, otherwise... Just why? Service is also non existent, I did all my own plates and bowls and barely got one refill in from my server. She even threw away my receipt which I was going to tip with and then left a tray for tips. Couldn't tell if it was a genuine accident or purposeful but either way, no service, no tip, kinda like it that way, guilt free money saving. Anyway, thanks for reading this far and save yourself the money, trouble and emotional disappointment of...