Yak Yak Yakitori!!!

Yakitori literally means grilled bird (chicken) but in reality it's not restricted to just one type of meat. Intrigued by KY's rave review of a yakitori buffet at Crystal Crown hotel, Wei Siong and me journeyed there one night to indulge.

Bottoms up!

Crunchy veggie sticks as appetizers!

So it's RM38++ for all you can eat yakitori from a menu. And it comes with a free beer or juice. Options on the menu range from the ever-present chicken, beef and vegetables to more exotic stuff like garlic wrapped in (chicken) skin and chicken cartilage. Yeah you heard that right, chicken cartilage. =D

Items of note:
crunchy cartilage (second row, left) &
tender special beef meatball (third row, middle)

Items of note:
pungent garlic wrapped in chicken skin (first row, right) &
crunchy salted gingko nuts (second row, middle)

Potato wrapped in beef. Juicy and satisfying. Also took the longest to arrive.

Conclusion? Great! The meat options, especially the beef ones were hearty and tender. As for the more exotic options I would say that the chicken cartilage would make a great snack dish as it's salty and crunchy while people who love pungent garlic (not me) would drool over the garlic wrapped in skin. Vegetables were fresh and there were no signs of overcooking. Thumbs up!

A couple of gripes though. First the length of time it took for the dishes to reach the table. Serving speed slowed down drastically as the restaurant filled up until a point where it took 15 minutes for a dish to reach our table. My guess is that their grilling area wasn't made to cater to a buffet crowd and glancing at the open kitchen area confirmed my suspicions. Their grill was simply too small! It's probably because this promotion is a not a permanent feature.

Serving speed also suffered when the restaurant started filling up. Refills of water and such took a long time. Insufficient staff probably?

Also, some of the beef dishes came with a wee bit too much pepper. But hey as long as they didn't drown the meat in pepper sauce I'm happy.

I notice that I've not been giving ratings for my past couple of reviews. I figure that sometimes it's difficult to put a number to the experience. So from now on I'm going to either recommend it heartily or ask you peeps to stay away. For this particular yakitori buffet I'm going to say...go for it!

Oh yes, according to KY's review the promotion is due to end on the 15th of April but when I was there they already amended it to 1st of April. Hurry! Hurry! =D