For dinner, my companion and I came to a bit of an impasse. He wanted Chinese food, whilst I wanted Japanese food. So we both came to a compromise and got Japanese food. Having already gorged myself on sashimi at the fish market, I didn't want to go to a straight up sushi bar again, so we opted for a BBQ buffet at Suminoya.
Calling in early to book a table, we were told that they only had two sessions, 5.45pm or 7.45pm. Travelling from Brisbane, we opted for the later session. Dining on a Sunday, we could only opt for the Premium Buffet, as the Gourmet one wasn't available.
Arriving a little early at 7.30, our table was ready in a number of minutes. I liked the setup of the table, which had the bbq on the side, rather than in the middle. It meant that when we ordered food, it would be able to be placed in the middle of our table.
Sauces, chopsticks and a hot towel were already awaiting us.
Drinks were ordrered through a paper menu, but all buffet foods were ordered through an Ipad, which appeared superior to our usual Nonbei in Brisbane, as we didn't need to write down orders on a piece of paper and wait for a waiter to pick it up from us, instead orders would shoot instantaneously into the kitchen, which definitely improved the timeliness of the meal, which was important as we only had 60 minutes ordering time and 90 minutes dining time.
From the drinks menu, I ordered the lemon chu hai. Compared to my usual at Wagyu ya, this had definitely a lot less by way of sake to lemonade ratio.
Our meats, which came in 100g portions soon arrived. We ordered the wagyu rib, wagyu harami, duck, and pork belly. Despite the beef being wagyu, the marbling was not thorough, and there were large fatty chunks and portions that were quite unmarbled, after being cooked, it was also quite chewy. The pork was slightly better, and thankfully not too fatty. It grilled well on the flame and was quite tender. Unfortunately we had high hopes for the duck (never having tried it before on this type of barbecue), but it was such a thick cut it was long toasted before being cooked through inside. Once it was cooked through the whole piece of meat was dry and chewy. My companion also made a point to say that the meats were really not presented very well, looking like they were tossed quite carelessly onto the plates.
Another dish of meat we had was the beef tongue, which was apparently highly popular here, since they only let you order one dish per person. It was considerably better marinated than the other dishes, and the meat was quite tender.
I also ordered the sashimi. Opting for five slices of Salmon, Kingfish and Tuna, they were soon delivered. The fish was not too fresh, with the flesh being quite soft and the cuts of salmon and kingfish being served with skin on, which was definitely disappointing after the high quality fish at the fish market.
Other sides we had included the potato salad, which was remarkably well seasoned and quite smooth.
I had some seaweed salad as well, which had a strong sesame oil fragrance to it.
I also ordered Unagi rice, which came with not as much chopped unagi as I would have liked, but there was at least more egg to accompany the rice. This dish was also drenched in the unagi bbq sauce, which made it quite delicious.
Being more of a noodle fan however, I also settled on a hot udon soup. It came with a large variety of toppings, including tempura, wakame, shallots and bonito flakes, giving it quite a flavour hit. The noodles however were a little too overcooked and soggy for my liking.
Price Range: $60 - $70pp
Taste: 6/10
Value: 6/10
Service: 7/10
Environment: 7/10
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