Il Mee Buffet, Little River Turnpike in Annandale - Closed

[jparrott]

DonRocks said:

Il Mee Buffet is sheer quantity at the expense of quality.

Y'know, that's I think a little bit harsh. At least at the Il Mee in Annandale, the kimchee is fresh-tasting and well-balanced (with many, many choices), the meats are solid and well-marinated without going too far, and the service is solicitous enough. It does what it does decently enough. Sure, the steam-table stuff is avoid-at-all-costs and the sushi is little more than filler, but methinks Rocks protests a bit too much.

[goldenticket]

Il Mee Buffet is sheer quantity at the expense of quality.

That explains a lot, as the person who told me about it is a recent grad on a tight budget with a HUGE appetite - sounds like just the place for him

  I discussed a few Annandale establishments in the second post of this thread (scroll up!). 

Cheers,

Rocks

I did see those - I think I'm going to have to try them on my own time/dime - looks like the group is going to wind up at Woo Lae Oak... I guess I'll at least be able to provide a firsthand report, if nothing else!

Thanks for the info!

[johnb]

Y'know, that's I think a little bit harsh.  At least at the Il Mee in Annandale, the kimchee is fresh-tasting and well-balanced (with many, many choices), the meats are solid and well-marinated without going too far, and the service is solicitous enough.  It does what it does decently enough.  Sure, the steam-table stuff is avoid-at-all-costs and the sushi is little more than filler, but methinks Rocks protests a bit too much.

I agree with the parrot on this one. Steam table items are always a bit dicey, but Il Mee's meats to be BBQed on the little burners, sauced, and wrapped in the lettuce are quite OK, and that is what the place is basically about in the first place. Just have that and pretty much ignore the rest and you'll be fine. And the price can't be beat. Tyler Cowen remains up on this place and I think he's on target.

[deangold]

Unfortunate neme... good food. Located on Little River Turnpike, Il Mee is a nice Korean Buffet. They remodeled a little while back reducing the hot bar items by 70% and increasing the BBQ offerings, a quite good idea! The deal here is that you can have all you can eat BBQ cooked at your table.

The food is divided into a hot bar, the BBQ side and sushi. The sushi looked good but was all wrapped in saran and somehow it didn't appeal to me that day. The hot bar had a few really good items: Zuchini stuffed with beef, dipped in an egg batter and pan fried, kimchee pankace and seafood pancake, a couple of noodle dishes that looked good and OK yaki mandoo.

On the other side of the buffet you start with cold noodles and icy beef broth. There are noodles and several add in like pickled cukes, shredded daikon etc. Excellent. Next up is a wide assortment of Kimchee and other stuff. There are two kinds of water kimchee (whose juice you mix with the broth for the noodles) that were fantastic. The Kimchee etc is quite good with a large asortment.

Then comes the BBQ section. Plain beef comes frozed and sliced paper thin. Get some sesame oil with pepper salt for dipping and some shredded lettuce with hot peppers for wrapping. The spicy pork is incredibly good, as good as at any other BBQ place I have been to. The beef is quite good as well. They ahve a lot of diffreent dipping sauces and raw garlic. When you return to your table, the waitresses will cook your BBQ. When I am on my own, this is one of my favorite places to go as I can have a wider variety of flavors and dishes at a reasonable price (well reasonable if I hadn't had so much sake).

[synaesthesia]

This used to be our favorite place back in college, especially for large groups. It was tons of yummy all-you-can-eat meat for about $20. (I think they've raised the prices.) It's an even better deal at lunch time when (at least a few years ago) I think the price was around $10/person. However, the quality of the meat seemed to not be as good and there was a slightly smaller selection. It was always nice to end with a bowl of cinnamon or rice punch.

[deangold]

However, the quality of the meat seemed to not be as good and there was a slightly smaller selection. It was always nice to end with a bowl of cinnamon or rice punch.

2 kinds of pork, 2 chicken, 3 beef all high quality. It did go down hill before the renovation, but my lst two trips have been quite good. I would say the lunch beffet is around $13.

[deangold]

I had lunch there the other day and the food was still really good for the price although lunch is now 13.99. I had a nice assortment of shushi, mainly rolls but very good squid and some sort of flatfish. The meats for the grill were particularly good, at lest as good as at woo mi or many other Korean places. I had tender pork, kalbi, the trim portion around the short rib bone and brisket. Also a very good soon du boo tofu. Cinnamon soup for dessert.