Jongro Korean BBQ Buffet

Jongro Korean BBQ Buffet is newly opened at 754 Yonge St. just south of Bloor, about as central Toronto and transit-accessible as possible. If this seems familiar, for a long time it was a Korean Grill House, so it makes sense it converted to another BBQ place avoiding the expense of building all those BBQ tables with gas fittings. We went for weekend lunch. Note that there are no seasonings (yet?) at the tables such as soy-based sauce or shakeable cumin-based barbecue seasoning. However check the salad bar and there are sauces there. Even though there is an online menu accessed via a QR code it is read-only, and the barbecue orders are placed through the waitstaff. There are included drinks and when we were there it was lemonade and orange juice from dispensers, coffee, and three available flavours of tea bags. The lemonade was excellent and very strong. Unfortunately, disposable chopsticks are used so we brought our own as always.

From the buffet, cream of mushroom soup was a bit too sweet for my taste, thick and didn't have much mushroom flavour but wasn’t bad. Chili shrimps for at least not overly hot which was a welcome relief... they did have some sweetness in which I don't like. Thankfully also the crispy chicken wings were not excessively hot, which I found at some other Korean places. Beef and radish soup was delicious and had a slight peanut flavour but I enjoyed it and it wasn't overly spicy. Egg fried rice was very good. Spaghetti arabiata was rather plain, just spaghetti and tomato sauce; perhaps it was supposed to be marinara but it wasn't bad.

Kimchi had a tiny bit of the horrid spice that burns my mouth for many minutes, but thankfully only a tiny bit, and I’m appreciative that this place got it right unlike the last one. There is a mixed tempura basket with onion rings, yam tempura, fries and even kale tempura and all of them were quite good. There is a make-your-own udon station where udon noodles are in little bowls and the diner adds broth to the left of it and then nori, garlic and green onions to taste. The result was excellent as the broth is very flavourful.

Steamed beef and steamed pork in wooden containers was rather plain as could be expected perhaps there was a sauce I was supposed to use but I still enjoyed them. Jokbal which is aged pig trotters was not one of my favourites, and I don't think I'd have it again... It has a gamey, odd flavour. I guess it's something you have to grow up with. Japchae glass noodles we both enjoyed and the seasoning was good.

From the barbecue, Mishy was very impressed from the meat. I really enjoyed the sausage and it was better than most other places; although a touch salty it was delicious. As noted above make sure to check the salad bar for sauces as they are not present at the table. For this reason, the soy beef offerings were preferable as at least they have something pre-added. We both loved the corn cheese. Yet again Mishy was nervous about the finger beef thinking they were made with cow fingers and I had to explain that cows don't have any, similarly to chicken fingers. I was delicious with the salad bar sauce.

For dessert, Mishy didn't like the ice cream and said it was watery, but really this was just because it was soft serve so it melted easily. It was very creamy and I had a second even though it was just vanilla. Just beside there is a toaster with bread in the mixed pastries area, and there is strawberry jam that can be put on the ice cream. We also adored the apple fritter with a honeycomb pattern. It’s $32 for weekend lunch and this is quite good these days factoring in the included beverages. Other than the Jokbal, it was quite an enjoyable lunch.

Rating: 8 - 8.5 / 10 + 0.5 value adjustment = 8.5 – 9 / 10