Treat from a stingy person

Yesterday, a stingy person gave a dinner buffet treat at the Vienna International Seafood & Teppanyaki Buffet restaurant.

I found the name of the restaurant to be rather contradictory. Vienna is the capital of Austria, which is smacked in the middle of the large European continent and nowhere near to the sea. There are however numerous freshwater lakes in the country and seafood is the last thing on anyone's mind when visiting Austria. To top it off, teppanyaki is obviously Japanese. So unless the owner comes from Vienna or is in total awe of the capital, I couldn't really find a logical reason for the restaurant's name. And it doesn't help that 99.999% of the restaurant staff are Chinese.

But then again, who cares about the name of the restaurant if the food is nice.

Yesterday's treat was my fourth visit to the restaurant. I would have to admit that the first three visits left quite a good impression on me. Hence, I came back for the fourth time. However, it was the first time I had dinner there and the noise level was close to beating that at the hawker centre. Everyone's pushing and sweeping food off the buffet tables and for a whopping price of $45/pax, I would honesty rather go somewhere else for a quieter and less 'competitive' dinner.

The drink menu on the table explicitly state that all guests get to enjoy complementary fruit juices or soft drinks. With the cheapskate mentally, I was initially thrilled but then thinking back now, isn't this part of the buffet deal?

I also realised that the food variety is not that great either. After returning to the buffet tables for a third helping, I realised that I have already circled the tables twice and thinking hard what next to take.

For the record, I had two bowls of sharksfin soup. And before you jump to the wrong conclusion, let me elaborate on the contents. It's a thick soup with lots of frozen crab meat and a few slices of mushrooms. It doesn't bother me so much on the part of the missing sharksfin because the frozen crab meat actually tastes nice after some generous sprinkle of vinegar and pepper. But I do propose for them to change the label for the soup to "Frozen Crab Meat Drowned In Thick Starchy Soup". That said, it's still considered Yummy for me! And to the disappointed individuals, I do recall that there used to be some strands of sharksfins in the soup during my previous visits. So simply for the benefits of doubt, there might be some "Save The Shark" conservation campaign somewhere and as a result, they could not get their regular supplies on time. It might just make a comeback soon.


I must also not forget to mention their starter soup which was served to the customers even before they get to their seats. It's "Buddha Jump Over the Wall". Well, quite honestly, I didn't feel like jumping over the wall for joy when I peeped at the content. I would rather they rename it to Herbal Chicken Soup. Too much hype can be a killer at times.

After gobbling up heaps of prawns, I staggered over to the dessert section and was pleased to get my hands on the first slice of chocolate mousse cake layered on hazelnut crunchy biscuit base! Ohhhh......I simply love the crunchy biscuit base!!! The second runner up would have to be the durian cake which was disguised as a coconut sponge cake. Looks can be deceiving and without venturing, you might be missing something.

Finally, if you must know, I'm the scrooge. :)