Review | Vegetarian Korean buffet and DIY bibimbap at Bobsang in Tsing Yi for less than US$12
- Popular vegetarian buffet includes a make your own bibimbap and hot and cold dishes
- Bobsang also offers unlimited soup and drink refills
There is no shortage of food options in Tsing Yi’s Maritime Square shopping centre where Bobsang is located. However, the Korean restaurant stands out for offering a vegetarian buffet for herbivores and health-conscious eaters.
We visited during a Sunday lunchtime and the wait for the buffet was surprisingly long. We took a number for the queue and walked around the shopping centre for at least half an hour before being seated.
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There are two prices, HK$88 for an hour or HK$132 for 90 minutes. For fast eaters, the one-hour option is good value.
Bobsang also has an a la carte section where meat dishes are available for order. The vegetarian buffet and the a la carte area are clearly separated so there is no confusion between the two.
The buffet has around six hot dishes, including braised mushrooms and stir-fried rice,.with cold dishes such as rice noodle salad, beans, kimchi and sweet potatoes. A few Western dishes are available as well, such as vegetarian pizza and French fries.
The highlight of the buffet is the DIY seaweed bibimbap – a Korean mixed rice bowl. Instructions on a card show customers how to select their preferred ingredients, and tell them to put on gloves to mix the rice bowl.
We had a go at the DIY bibimbap, heaping copious amounts of diced seaweed, cucumber, carrots, beet, leafy greens and corn into the bowl along with the rice. These were topped off with spicy red bibimbap sauce and a generous sprinkling of rice seasoning.
We mixed the ingredients in a large bowl. The bibimbap was aesthetically pleasing before the mixing, with the vegetables creating a palette of colours. After mixing, it still looked good and we enjoyed the taste, too.
Bobsang also offers unlimited drink and soup refills. Customers can choose from rice tea or a plum flavoured drink. The hot soups were a kimchi tofu stew and a seaweed broth.
If you are in Tsing Yi for shopping and feel like a healthy lunch, Bobsang is a good choice.
Bobsang, Shop 119B, 1/F Maritime Square, 33 Tsing King Road, Tsing Yi, tel: 3105 9836.
Open: noon to 10.30pm(from 11.30am on Saturday, Sunday and public holidays).
If you like Korean food
