Fried chicken wing buffet at Seoul Bistro

On the morning of Good Friday I saw on facebook that my favourite Korean fried chicken joint was introducing an all you can eat fried chicken buffet for (a promotional price of) under $20 per head:

SUNNYBANK'S FIRST FRIED CHICKEN BUFFET!!!That's right!!! Unlimited fried chickenUnlimited home made lemon ice...
Posted by Seoul Bistro - Sunnybank on Thursday, 2 April 2015

They says it's Sunnybank's first fried chicken buffet, and I've certainly never seen something similar before, so kudos to them for a great idea and a great price. The procrastinator in me has never gotten around to blogging about Seoul Bistro, but a big reason for this blog is to highlight small businesses like this which are big winners in my books. They first opened in December 2013, and I went twice in 3 days after "discovering" them. It was a bit more difficult eating out in 2014 juggling the demands of a newborn child, but I managed 4 visits. Today I returned for visit #7 and the promise of some serious chicken wing action.

View from the street corner outside.

We got there at 1:30pm and the place was still pretty full. We were given one of the outside tables, which was mostly ok apart from having to battle

1. Flies - obviously as attracted to the food as we were!
2. Second hand smoke from smokers who gather a few meters away on the public footpath where there happens to be a bench and bin. I look forward to increasing bans on smoking in public places.

Menu

Didn't take a close look at the menu because I'd been here before, but mainly because I already knew I was coming for the buffet! It seems the buffet is quite popular - the shop reports they served up 150kgs of wings on Friday (first day of the promotion), and some anecdotal reports say they were caught a little off-guard with the (high) level of response, so struggled to keep up with the demand. The co-owner/waitress with whom I've spoke a few times said she was at work until 2am last night/this morning prepping for today's trade... speaking of which, our first course of wings:

Our first lot of fried chicken - half yang nyum flavour

and half normal flavour.

We were actually still sitting around waiting for our friends to arrive when the first platter of wings were brought out. This was a little surprising as I didn't think we had ordered anything yet. In any case it was what we came for so wifey and I got stuck into these wings. They hadn't been fried to order, so weren't super piping hot, though still warm and we had no complaints about the taste. The other half of our table arrived soon after and we quickly worked our way through this first course.

Platter of bones.

The fried chicken buffet comes with a few other (non-unlimited) dishes:

Beer battered chips (with tomato sauce).

The chips were a bit on the salty side for me. Still good, but would've been better starting with less salt, and with salt provided to be added to taste.

Japanese cheese egg omelette

I thought when I first saw the facebook post about the buffet deal that this element of the deal was okonomiyaki. I either mis-remembered, or this element was subsequently changed to an omelette. Either way, it was received well by all on our table.

Home made lemon ice tea.

We could have had unlimited tea, but the two jugs tuned out to be just about right for our consumption. If I wasn't so busy eating meat I probably would've drunk a bit more of this tea. It had a nice flavour and wasn't too sweet; very refreshing.

Second platter of yang nyum chicken wings.

It didn't quite occur to me that we needed to ask for more chicken (mostly because we didn't ask for the first lot - it just came out), but when prompted and told there were three flavours of chicken to choose from, we were unanimous in saying we wanted all three. The only one I hadn't tried was the sweet/honey soy flavour, which is a new addition to the menu since my earlier visits.

Third platter of honey soy + normal flavour wings.

Can you ever have too much fried chicken? I'm sure the answer is yes... but we weren't there yet, so resumed our demolition of the wings with gusto. I quite liked the honey soy chicken, maybe almost as much as I like the yang nyum chicken, and only wished I had more stomach room to entertain a few more of their kind. Although the normal fried chicken comes a distant third, it was good to have something plainer to stagger with the other two flavours which (particularly with the yang nyum flavour) I find get pretty rich after a few.

The buffet deal was supposed to also include unlimited Korean side dishes (banchan), but we weren't served a single one and I didn't notice any on the few tables I could easily see. Not sure if they forgot / were too busy, or maybe took it off the buffet offerings and have one less thing to contend with. It didn't make a big difference to my enjoyment of the wings, and it wasn't significant enough on this day for me to ask about it.

What did surprise me greatly was what came out next - a surprise complimentary taste of one of the newer and reportedly popular items on their menu:

Bonus dish - tender Woo Chow pork ribs.

Reverse angle.

I'm not sure why we got this dish - the waitress just said we're being given this to try. Maybe it's because she remembers my face/name from previous visits and brief chats :) Whatever the case, this is one gift horse I'd be putting in my mouth!

Bite/cut shot.

The menu description of this dish is "juicy tender pork ribs marinated for three days for maximum flavour and tenderness, then coated in our special Woo Chow sauce". There's a BBQ sauce option too. I have no idea what Woo Chow sauce is, but this was pretty nice too. Texture wise it was a bit drier than I thought it should be, so there's no falling off the bone happening here, but I'd say the flavour component was up there in the realm of maximum! Because everyone else was already pretty full, I ended up eating about half of this ribs dish.

My plate of bones.

This was after the bones from the first platter of wings had been cleared. So besides the pork ribs and other sides, I managed 10 wings for the session. Both wifey and I were so full that we skipped dinner altogether. This is certainly not something you'd want to do every day but I sure hope the buffet sticks around and doesn't get too pricey after the introductory period expires, because I'd definitely want to have it again!

And so, to summarise:

• What was good
• The fried chicken
• The fried chicken
• The fried chicken! Particularly enjoyed the yang nyum chicken (a favourite from previous visits) and the honey soy chicken.
• The lemon ice tea
• The omelette
• The complimentary tasting of the pork ribs
• What was not so good
• Flies and second hand smoke when sitting outside
• No sign of the Korean side dishes (I subsequently heard from other friends who went that they did get some side dishes, so looks like we just got missed, though it was more than made up for by the pork ribs!)
• Chips could do with a bit less salt
• Service could be a bit more attentive (I know it was busy, but apart from the water and cups on the table, we had to DIY or ask for other things like napkins, the tea, and cutlery.).

The fried chicken buffet is currently available at all trading times lunch and dinner. Depending on popularity they may in the future decide to limit the buffet on weekend dinners. Call 3345 6360 to book.