Critic's Review
Time for another buffet. It's the only way to get a good value in this town; and the Dragon "Gourmet" buffet is one of the best. It sways Chinese, in contrast to the other Japanese buffets, so sushi is not the main focus here. They do have dim sum.
In a broken down shopping center anchored by Carrabbas which is dead empty during the day; they have a nice storefront.
The place was pretty empty; I got there at 2:30, which is kinda late for lunch. I didn't plan to come here today; when I'm going to a buffet I try to get there earlier to have a better chance of getting fresher food.
The dining room is clean with zero privacy. This is the time of day when employees eat.
I hit the buffet room to scope out the choices. A lot of fried stuff. Too much other stuff to eat deep fried food.
I usually like to start out a meal with a salad, so I got some of that. They have creamy italian which is good since I despise the usual Chinese dressings. I needed lemon for my iced tea, Might as well grab some shrimp too.
They has some whitefish which look better than the usual buffet stuff. Salmon too. Bok choy, Broccoli, pork on a stick and some babu octopus. The whitefish was quite good; not something i'd want as a main course but much better than what you get at the typical buffet.
Pass #3. The Dim Sum doesn't look at good as I'd hoped. I grabbed a couple with some chicken and brocolli and shrimp with lobster sauce.
The "shrimp" dim sum (on the right) was disappointing. The other one was better. the fried dumpling were too well done. Don't want to break a tooth on a dumpling. Lobster sauce doesn't actually have lobster in it; I'm not sure most South Floridians know that.
Pass 4. Pepper steak, General Tso's, "boneless" ribs. Lo Mein and "Kung Pao" Mushrooms.
Nothing good here. Chinese ribs are never any good. The Chicken was too dry and not spicy. The melt in your mouth beef always baffles me; you can't marinate beef for a day. The mushrooms just tested like boiled mushrooms.
Time for some sushi. The bar wasn't too impressive. The escolar looked awful. Tuna and salmon not much better.
I tried a couple of rolls.
They had a carving station with Chinese roasted pork; I lopped off a piece. Decent stuff, but cold by this time of day despite the heat lamp.
No room for dessert today. You can see a sample from the last visit.
Conclusion
$12.10 with the iced tea. Still a good value, but I'd recommend getting here earlier. Some of the food I had was just out too long, which is always a concern on a buffet. Of course I'm not sure how much they leave out through dinner.
Review 5/14/12
There are a lot of buffet restaurants in South Florida, with Shinju and Kyojin leading the way with the most locations. But Chinese food is more my speed, and there's nothing better than going to a chinese restaurant with a big group and sharing 20 or so items.
The Dragon Gourmet Buffet has 200 items; for lunch it's just $8.99. It's not just a buffet; you can order from a regular menu or you can do the buffet. If you sit in the dining room in the front, you'd hardly know that there was a buffet going on in the rear.
As buffet places go, it's a pretty nice place. There are a couple of partially separate rooms with music playing low enough that you can't really tell what it is.
The girls who work here don't speak English too well, but they quietly dart in and out; grabbing dirty plates as you make your passes as the buffet. The service is kind of strange; they brought me iced tea without lemon and they give you a knife and a fork in a rollup. They carry chopsticks in their belt, but you have to ask for them. This is a pretty Gringo kind of place. Luckily they have lemon at the buffet.
The first thing you do is hit the buffet.
The buffet has 7 areas; 5 islands, a long dessert table along the side wall and the sushi counter in the rear. I started with some soup; a bit of hot and sour and egg drop.
The hot and sour was pretty good, not too hot or sour, but pretty good. The egg drop was a bit goopy; what's great about buffets is that you don't have to eat stuff you don't like. So it was on to get a full plate.
Green Beans, pepper steak, spare ribs, dumplings, bbq pork and fried rice. The rib wasn't that good, but everything else was pretty good quality.
Another round. Baby Bok Choy, Dim Sum and an egg roll.
Back for some peel and eat shrimp and mussels. The good thing about a buffet is that there's plenty of lemon for iced tea.
Shrimp with lobster sauce. Salt and Pepper Shrimp. they have quite a wide selection of hot food.
The sushi wasn't so great; This is a Chinese buffet, so sushi is just sort of an add on.
I tried some egg drop soup that wasn't too memorable.
One thing about this place is that they have a fairly extensive dessert bar; I tried the Red Bean Ice Cream and also some sugarless Coffee Fudge Swirl. The coffee was just ok, but the Red Bean was really good. As was the cream puff. The dessert table also has a lot of fruit; there were a lot of people eating watermelon; but I don't really think about fruit after eating chinese food.
Conclusion
So what I can generally say is that the food here is pretty good quality. They keep the buffet stocked and in good order, and the people here were pretty well behaved. They don't have nearly as much sushi selection as the japanese buffets, so I wouldn't come here primarily for sushi; the dim sum wrappers were doughy and not very good, and the egg roll was junk. But there's more than enough good quality items to make just about anyone feel like they got more than their money's worth.
You really can't go wrong here. The total for 4 plates of food, dessert and bottomless Iced Tea was $11.33.