Bamboo Buffet & Grill

I’ve eaten at Bamboo off and on since it opened. When it opened, it was great. The only thing that keeps it from being consistently great is that from time to time, the food is not kept at serving temperature. Today I am down with a cold and really wanted some good hot and sour soup – so we arrived at 11:20, shortly after it opened. The tactic was mostly successful, with the exceptions of pot stickers and veggie lo mein. My wife said the egg foo yung gravy was lumpy, and the e.f.y. proper tasting like flour. I, being out of it, didn’t see what made my wife ask the woman who brought us and our utensils to the table to bring some «she hadn’t sneezed on», but I’m glad she asked.

It was okay but nothing special. Pretty typical and a tad pricey. Service was fine and food was all good, warm, and properly prepared. Just nothing out of the ordinary. It does the job!

I really wanted to rate this place higher. I took a look at the buffet during lunch time before suggesting to my husband that we eat there for dinner, and decided that it looked stellar.
When we went there for dinner, the buffet looked to have stayed exactly the same, with no new items added to justify the higher price.
I thought the décor was gaudy and awesome, and the service is actually wonderful. The entire place is very clean, and the bathrooms are very nice.
The food leaves a lot to be desired. The only items that were really delicious were the bourbon chicken, the peel and eat shrimp, the mussels, the glass noodles, and hot and sour soup.
The sushi is a total joke.
Only 6 rolls to choose from, all housed by inches of rice:
1. Tempura crunch flakes with teriyaki sauce on top
2. Seaweed
3. Unidentifiable baked fish
4. Cooked shrimp
5. Cream cheese and imitation crab
6. Cucumber and carrots
This is sham sushi!

It’s ok. They have variety on their side, just nothing tastes all that great. Especially for the $ 10 a lunch on a Sunday.

You know… Des Moines just has suck choices for Chinese food. I’ve tried the non-​chain, small restaurants too like A Dong (no homo) and Cheng’s Garden, but aside from P.F. Chang’s, Des Moines really needs to get some good azn restaurants.
So with that out of the way. Bamboo Buffet & Grill is the best of the worst. At the time of this review I haven’t tried the new Hibachi Buffet on 22^nd and University in Clive, but I’ve hit all the others (some have gave me food poisoning lol).
It basically goes like this. The buffet is going to suck if it’s slow, that’s just how it is. If it’s busy, there’s greater chance the food is going to be fresh.
I’m a fan of General Tso’s chicken, and Bamboo Fails quite badly at this dish, it’s NEVER spiced properly. I’ll still reserve a small corner of my plate for it IF it looks fresh. What I would recommend is their Bourbon Chicken. Charred pieces of chicken breast in a very dark brown sauce. It may not look good, but it is. Other people think so too because it’s usually gone quick. Their crab rangoons and egg rolls suck and they go fast too. The «grill» is usually just a Mexican guy standing nearby picking his nose. I’m not letting him grill anything I plan on eating. The sushi looks awful too… You’re a brave soul if you try that.
It boils down to this: if you want quantity over quality go here. It’s the standard bullshit Chinese that Des Moines seems to harbor… Mexicans in the back cooking, and Asians up front for show.
Best of the worst ²⁄₅ stars

DO NOT go here now! We went on May 9^th, 2014 and all three of us got sick that night. All their food was soaking in oil and way over salted. We honestly can’t believe how down hill this place has gone! Service sucked. I got our refills as no waiter/​waitress was in the cubbyhole where the drinks are kept. Add to this the large amount of smelly customers for that day and it drove us away. Eat at your our risk!

New to the area and found one of my top Chinese place.
Great selection of food combine with solid service in a relaxing, open atmosphere. What more can you ask for??! Perhaps soft serve ice cream to close the meal experience… lol.
The food selection is great with traditional Chinese selections with better seafood options from soft shell crab to frog legs.
The wait service is the most attentive in my buffet experience hands-​down. Also the cooks re-​filled the food outage within minutes.
Try it and find out for yourself. Overall reasonable cost for a nice buffet style Chinese with drinks included in your price.

Awesome place, didn’t even know this place existed since I’m usually not hanging out in this area. First, the décor of this place is great, you can noticeably tell they spent a good amount of money on the interior design. The staff members were very friendly and attentive to our plate and water status.
The food to give a vague answer was great! Not to get into specifics, but there were some food items which I could not finish after taking a bite. Overall, you will find amazing food selections here to be able to ignore subpar choices.
I will definitely return if I was in the area in the mood for a Chinese buffet.

Typical chinese buffet. Nothing really stuck out to except there’s a guy in the back who can fry up some steak n veggies for you.

The food is good. But not that hot. I think all they need is to increase the temp of the food warmers. The workers are VERY FRIENDLY, HOSPITABLE and POLITE! The store, facility per se is SUPER CLEAN! The waiters they wipe table very very clean. I admire the good workers in here! Food as Chinese buffet, lots of selections! Not that bad for $ 8.64 including unlimited soda!!!