China Buffet — Restaurant in Surprise

China Buffet is a Chinese buffet which is inexpensive. Weekday lunch is cheaper than dinner and weekends but anytime is still inexpensive. There are always coupons in the local coupon mailers which gives added value. The food itself is really good. They always have egg rolls and springrolls. They have a standard salad bar and fresh fruit/cold bar. Something that I personally love is their made Caesar salad. It always is made with fresh romaine and the dressing is very good. It's not something you would normally find at a Chinese buffet. Dinnertime brings crablegs and softball crabs (So good!) and two different shrimps. Along with your typical chinese buffet fare. They do a nice assortment of fresh, made right out at the counter sushi. They also have a desert bar with both a soft serve ice cream and a freezer full of assorted grab & go cups of ice cream. We eat here about once a week due to convenience and price. One of the things that sets this place apart from the others is the staff. They have had ALL the same staff for years! I watch them go above and beyond to keep the place clean. The hostess knows us everytime we come in. She knows our favorite table. The wait staff are all so hardworking. The staff truly has my admiration. One waiter in particular 'Ericson' is usually our waiter and he's fantastic! He adds a personal touch. He asks where our daughters are when my husband and I sneak in just the two of us. My hearing isn't that great and I have a hard time understanding him but what we do talk about makes me know he pays attention to us. He is so attentive and kind hearted. Tonight we cam in late and we were the last couple there before closing. He noticed me looking at the empty pan of soft she'll crabs and he started asking my husband and I what he could have the kitchen make for us. Next thing I know is out comes a heaping freshly cooked tray of soft she'll crab and new fresh shrimp even tho there already was some it wasn't fresh so he got us fresh stuff. He told us to eat all the crab if we want (no way we could have) but the guy looks out for us! The place to us is comfort, happiness, food, and relaxation. They play...

I didn't take any pictures.

I appreciated the variety. They had a lot of choices. Eight different bars, hot, cold, sushi, dessert.. And everything was ready upon opening.

The best items; -iced tea was really good. -While not the best, each of the three soups (wonton, hot and sour, egg drop) were decent. -The wonton in the soup was boring but the broth was very light but flavorful . -Oddly, the watermelon was really good. -The cream cheese ragoons were yummy. -I was happy to have crispy wontons to crunch on. -Sweet and sour sauce, with fried chicken on the side was good. -The hot mustard was good. -I appreciated the amount and variety of sauces and ramekins to put said sauces in.

The worst; -the sushi was exceptionally fishy, even though it was being freshly made. -the ginger was neon pink. -The shrimp cocktail was nice and cold and on ice. But needed to be peeled, with far too much shrimp poop to be comfortable eating it. -The salad greens were fresh. The ranch and Italian were horrible and the only options. -The meat egg roll was awful. -The vegetable egg foo young was fluffy, but the gravy was kinda like liquid dirt. -plain white rice tasted like cardboard. -plates were dirty more than clean. -the mushrooms were super spongy and had zero flavor.

Decent items; -everything was very fresh. So I cannot complain about the freshness. Everything was constantly being refilled and wiped down. -The Boa bun, was interesting and decent. I'd never had one. The meat was oddly sweet. -The orange chicken was strongly orange and ok. -The beef and broccoli, chicken and broccoli were fine. -Baked salmon was ok, l don't like salmon, but it wasn't bad. -Baked flounder was tasteless but that's not a bad thing. -fried rice and chow mein were perfectly decent. I did enjoy the large amount of cabbage in the noodles. -glass noddles were bland but fine. -not sure why the edamame was on the cold bar... -the green beans had an odd film on the outside, I didn't try them but my 3yo loved them.

Will I go back? Nope. Was I...

They must have raised their prices recently. $42+ for my wife and I and our 5 year old. The food wasn't that good. We each ate one normal portion and one dessert. My daughter had an orange slice, a lemon slice and one chicken finger thing plus 1 dessert. I apparently signed the wrong receipt; the "customer copy", and took the "merchant copy." (Both receipts are carbon copies with all the same info). The bus boy chased me down at the door and made us stand there while my wife dug thru her bottomless purse looking for the other copy of the same receipt while he hovered over us causing a spectacle and making it look like we were trying to get away with something. That actually worked to my advantage. I had added a tip on the receipt I signed and left at the table. When my wife finally found the other copy and with the bus boy hovering over my shoulder watching me like a hawk, I just drew a line thru the "tip" area and only paid the $42+ (which was still WAY MORE than it was worth). Won't be back. If we want to spend that much on lunch there are hundreds of places I can think of to go can go for FAR better food and FAR better service. In the past we went here when we couldn't all agree on what we wanted; they have a little bit of everything. It was never the best tasting food around and there really is no "service"; it's self-serve. But it was okay, it was different and the price was reasonable. We didn't realize they had raised their prices so drastically until they gave us the bill, so we wouldn't have gone back anyway for that reason alone. The kid chasing me down and stopping us at the door just...