Shuttered Korean barbecue spot Chung Moo Ro was never really in the ML price range, so we didn’t really mourn it when they closed up shop over the winter. Miss Korea Barbecue has just opened in its place. Both the new look of the space inside and the menu look remarkably similar to Haru Hana just down the block, so it may be the same owners.

Get a glimpse of the menu after the jump.

Sadly, just like its predecessor, the lunch menu is mostly out of ML range. Out of range or not, lunch prices for barbecued bulgogi and pork belly start at $12.95, which is impressive and may be worth the splurge to investigate.

There are a few stews under $10, but we’ll have to check that out when the weather cools down.

Miss Korea Barbecue, 10 West 32nd Street (btw 5+6th)

I have always lamented the fact that all the Korean fried chicken places in Midtown are only open for dinner… which makes this news that much more exciting!  Kyochon, the Korean fried chicken chain with U.S. branches in Flushing and L.A., is replacing the Brooklyn Bagel Cafe on 32nd and 5th in Koreatown.  Called the “granddaddy of the Korean fried-chicken scene” Kyochon features fried chicken flavored with soy sauce, garlic, and ton of spices… oh, and there are spicy version available. And of course, the most important thing… it’s open for lunch!  No word on when it will open, but it can’t be soon enough.

Thanks to Liz Matsumoto of norecipes.com for sending in the photo!

Kyochon, 319 5th Ave, New York, NY 10016

If you read this site often, you know I have fairly strict rules about price. I feel in my heart that lunch should not cost a person more than $10.  But I have equally strong feelings about buffets, and when it comes to something like the concept of all-u-can-eat, well… I can’t help but think that rules were meant to be broken.  I’ll admit up front I don’t break the rule too often for Indian buffets (there are good Indian buffets in Midtown for $10 to $11… so why spend $17?) but when it comes to Asian buffets, all bets are off.  So, two years ago this month I made a price exception and hit up the Todai buffet on 32nd btw. Madison+5th. I thought it was just ok, and definitely not as good as when it was Minado (its previous buffet incarnation, before being bought out by the big buffet chain.)

Since that time the price has gone up to $18.95, not completely shocking for a sushi buffet, but waaaay out of the Midtown Lunch price range (even for a buffet lover like me.)  But when I got an email invite to buffet it up with competitve eater (and profiled Midtown Lunch’er) Crazy Legs Conti and a few of his competitive eating buddies, how could I say no!?!

The play by play of our meal, their pearls of wisdom, and a photo of every plate put down by Crazy Legs… all after the jump.

It’s no secret that my dream-my “goal in life” if you will-is to strike fear in the heart of every buffet owner whose establishment I step into.  I even created a “Guide to Beating the All You Can Eat Chinese Buffet”; a life’s work (if you will) that consists of my rules for attacking a buffet. But, truth be told, I am a fat man… but not *that* fat.  And I’m short.  And while I can eat like a champ, I’m not an imposing figure.  What I’m saying is, no buffet owner is going to be afraid of losing his business after one of my visits.

These guys?  Now that’s a different story…

Beautiful Brian Seiken, Nasty Nate Biller, Crazy Legs Conti (Leon Feingold showed up later)

First sign I knew I was about to eat with professionals?  The original meeting time was set for 1:30pm… until Beautiful Brian set us all straight.  “The place fills up with too many people by that time.  We should get there for the opening bell.”  Awesome.  11:45 it is.  (We planned to meet at 11:30, just to be safe.)

Just walking in to the place with Brian, Nate and Crazy Legs made me feel like a champ.  It was like being part of some secret Las Vegas card counting team. As we were being lead to the table, all I could think was “this place has no idea what’s about to hit them.”

I was glad to see that the quality of the food had increased with the price.  It was more expensive than 2 years ago, but the sushi was much better- borderline very good.  Getting there early ensured that we had the pick of all the best stuff. And they didn’t do the classic sushi buffet trick of overloading each piece with rice.  In fact, the ratio of fish to rice was better than many sit down restaurants where you are paying by the piece.  I have to say, I was kind of impressed. They even had sea urchin! Alot of the hot food looked great too, so for my first “feeler” plate I did the classic “take a small bit of everything that looks good.” I did a good job on staying away from the sushi rolls, and focusing my seafood eating on the piece of sushi (which had less rice.)

When you are a mere mortal, portion control is very important.  You don’t want to load up on any one item that may or may not be good, because then you may end up wasting valuable space in your stomach on stuff that isn’t as tasty.  For competitive eaters, with bottomless stomachs, fear of getting full is not really an issue.

Nasty Nate Biller’s strategy was pretty simple.  Start from the left side of the buffet, load your plate up, and then work your way down the line, trip by trip, plate by plate.  He only eats 1 meal a day (sometimes 1 meal every two days) so this is it for him.  “Getting full” off the wrong items isn’t really a concern.  His first plate was all sushi from the far left hand side of the buffet.

Crazy Legs Conti attacked the buffet from a different mind set.  Like me, he does a walk-through before taking any food, just to survey the scene.  See what’s going on… and develop a plan of action. He also liked to group his plates into categories.  Here they are, in chronological order:

Plate 1: Crazy legs called this “Breakfast”. He also said he doesn’t like going immediately for the big money items… and yet his first plate was chock full of them. Stuffed clams, mussels, and two servings of tuna tartare (strong!).

Plate 2: Then he dippes his toe in on the sushi side…

Plate 3: And back again… for one of every single sushi roll.

Plate 4: My favorite quote of the day… as we were surveying the buffet at the beginning “Crazy Legs” spotted a couple of whole fish, which usually get cut up into pieces by the buffet-goers. His remark “Oooh. Whole fish. We’ll definitely have to get one of those.” Unfortunately, by the time he made it back to that part of the buffet, the fish had already been torn into, and he had to settle for just the tail portion. I really wanted one of his plates to have an entire fish on it. Oh well… you do what you can.

Plate 5: The Best-Of plate. Or what I like to call “my second plate.” My buffet usually breaks down like this. First plate is the feeler plate (little bits of everything that looks good), second plate is a best of plate. Third plate (usually 1/3 to 1/2 full) is those last few things I just can’t resist stuffing myself with (this plate often will include one last chicken wing and one last onion ring.) Crazy Legs’ “best of” plate was Plate #5. Clearly I have a lot to learn.

Plate 6: The palate cleansing “salad plate.” I usually don’t waste any of my stomach space on salad, but it’s hard to criticize a guy who ate 3 times as much as I did.

Plate 7: At this point Crazy Legs really had to get back to work, but unable to complete the meal without a little bit of dessert… he had one piece of jello. It may have been more for comedy than anything, but it still resonated with me on a very serious level. I don’t know why, but I must end every buffet trip with a little bit of jello.

Now, I know what a lot of you are thinking… actually that’s not true. I know what the fatso/buffet king crowd is thinking. “I expected him to eat more.” Well, in fairness to Crazy Legs, he had to get back to work- and technically their “Major League Eating contracts disallow ‘eating for time, speed, or quantity’ in unsanctioned conditions.” So for these guys, it was just a casual lunch among friends… and I’m pretty sure none of them left completely stuffed. I on the other hand, had to be rolled home.

Todai, 6 E. 32nd St. (btw. Madison+5th), 212-725-1333

One final note: The buffet is $18.95 Monday through Thursday. On Fridays the price goes up to $21.95. Also, Todai is about to change their name to Ichi Umi for some unknown reason. The lady at the front said that it would be the same food, same price, and same owners… just a different name. So don’t get confused when they put the new signs up.

With that in mind, we went to the New York Todai, hoping that some of the Minado goodness was held over in the transition.  Todai is what is known by buffet aficionados as a “Super Buffet”.  It’s a very technical term, and might be difficult to understand for the buffet lay-person.  ”Super” refers to the awesome size and nature of the buffet in question.  Most Super Buffets have many stations, and at least 50 items (I just made that up… I don’t think there is any real measure). 

Super Buffets also require a totally different technique from your small scale and regular size buffets.  With the small buffets it is easy to load your plate up with the 10-20 items they have available… but with a Super Buffet you need to be more cautious.  I like to take small bits of as many items as possible, scope out the real winners and then return for larger portions of the 3 or 4 things that I really loved.

Tackling Minado, the food porn, and the +/- after the jump…

The biggest problem with Todai because apparent from the second we arrived there.  The set up.  Most of the best buffets have multiple stations, usually in a square or circle format where you can rotate around different squares picking out things you want.  See something you like, jump in load up and step out.  Plates are available on every possible corner with empty space, and it’s easy to get a fresh one and fill it up with tasty buffet treats.  This set up has been tested extensively (mostly in fat buffet rich states like Texas and Massachusetts) and then adopted by the rest of the countries Super Buffets*.   Todai is set up as one long gigantic line, with only one side available to take food from (the other side is where the workers replenish the food).  (* Scientific testing on buffet set ups probably did not happen… the set up described above is just common sense.)

At Todai, one end of the long line is the sushi, on the other end is the hot food, and in the middle is a very large selection of cold and warm “salad” type items… or as I like to call it “filler”.  In this case, it literally was the filler between the hot food and the sushi, and while gigantic lines formed on either side of the buffet (to get to the hot food and the sushi), the middle remained largely empty and accessible to anyone who could fight through the crowds on either side to get an empty plate.

I knew we were in trouble when I saw the stream of people coming down the stairs from the balcony (all with nametags on).  Five minutes before we got there, I’m pretty sure 27 buses had dropped of the most gigantic tour group imaginable and the place was totally packed.  I waited on line and attempted my “take a tiny bit of everything” strategy, but it was tough.  Because of the sheer number of people, a lot of the good things were totally out when you got to them, and then once you made your way across the the line of hot food (and salads) towards the sushi, the sushi line from the other side was trying to fight past you, to get to the salads and hot food.  A total disaster. 

I managed to snag 4 or 5 pieces of sushi (which was also pretty depleted because of the crowds) to add to my fried calamari, one chicken wing, shrimp on a skewer, two selections of fish, and my one piece of “tempura roll”.  At most buffets, you like to see a little bit of a crowd, because it insures that the food will be finished quickly and replaced with fresh, hot food.  An empty buffet, means the same containers of food sit out there for 30 mins to an hour waiting to be eating.  Surprisingly many of the hot foods were not that hot… despite being constantly swapped out. 

This could have easily been overlooked (as I do at many buffets- after all freshness is not a buffet’s fortay) if it had been easy to stuff my face.  But the food was hard to get to, and the lines on either side were long for the entire time we were there… resulting in what I’m pretty sure is easily my “WORST SECOND BUFFET PLATE OF ALL TIME”:

Pathetic.  I was embarrassed.  But the crowd and frustration of waiting in line had taken it’s toll… thrown me off my game…. and this was the result.  I’m almost embarrassed to post the picture.  In Boston I was a buffet eating master… second only to a small Chinese girl named Cyndi.  (I still don’t know how she always beat me… it’s like that hot dog contest eating guy.  A miracle of science.)  I hope Cyndi never sees the embarrassment of this meal.  I’ll never live it down.   (Click here to see a real second plate… courtesy of one of my wife’s co-workers.  She knew how to do it up right…)

That’s not to say the buffet is terrible… but I think there are certain things that might help your enjoyment.  First, maybe Friday at 12:30pm is a bad time to go.  Maybe it’s buffet day for tour groups.  I’m guessing on a Monday or Tuesday it will probably be less crowded, and easier to stuff your face.  Secondly, I think Todai might be a buffet for people who don’t love buffets.  I’m a fat guy… and buffet eating for me is about winning the game.  The place charges a price, and puts out food.  Then it challenges me… “Can you eat enough food to make it worth the price that I have set forth?”  At some buffets, the challenge is super hard… like the Bellagio which forces you to eat over $30 worth of food!  When a buffet is under $10 it’s almost laughable.  I can eat $10 worth of bad buffet food 15 minutes after Thanksgiving dinner, blindfolded and handcuffed (now that would be an appetizing sight!).  Of course “tougher” or “smarter” buffets will set up obstacles- like bread, rice, and french fries.  Small money items that really fill you up, but work against you winning the game.  It’s like Chess for really fat people.

Needless to say, on this day Todai beat me.  $13.95 (plus tax and tip) is more then I usually like to pay for a Midtown Lunch, and with the long lines and poor set up, it proved to be too much for me in the end.  If winning the game is not your objective… and your strategy is just to have a nice lunch with a lot of variety, that includes sushi and some healthier salad type options that most Asian buffets usually don’t have… then you will really enjoy Todai.  For us buffet athletes… I’d recommend going on a Tuesday- or just head one avenue over to the $9.95 small scale Korean/Sushi Buffet Arang.  The selection might be smaller, but at least they make it easy to leave feeling disgustingly stuffed.  After all, with buffets, sometimes bigger doesn’t always mean better.

THE +

• Huge variety.  It’s a “Super Buffet” so there are a ton of different options for every taste…
• A lot of fish options (aside from sushi).  A much larger number of the hot options are fish, comapred to your normal buffet…
• A lot of really good Japanese salad/vegetable options.  The middle of the buffet had all sorts of things that will leave you full, but feeling better then buffets dominated by the fried stuff.  Delicious roasted eggplant, cold soba noodles, tofu and more.  (I usually preach to stay away from these “fillers”… but if you are into a buffet with some non-fried healthier items- you might really enjoy Todai)
• Sushi is made fresh right behind the counter, and although it was depeleted because of the crowds it was much better then the Todai in Los Angeles.  (Not great, but better then a lot of buffet sushi… and a huge selection)

THE -

• The set up makes it very difficult to go up for multiple visits on a super busy day (which clearly Friday is).
• A lot of the things were depleted because of the crowds… something that wouldn’t be an issue if it was easy to get back up there when the new things came out.
• A lot of the hot food wasn’t that warm
• There was a great looking grill station where they were cooking up various things on sticks but it was so popular, I think the chef was rushing the stickes off the grill.  My shrimp on a stick was slightly undercooked.
• The price.  $14 is a little too much for a Midtown Lunch ($17 after tax and tip)… especially when don’t get free reign to eat as much as you want.  (And especially when Arang is a few blocks away for $10)

Todai, 6 E. 32nd St. (btw. 5+Mad), 212-725-1333