All You Can Eat VIETNAMESE BUFFET in Houston Texas

Hi, it's Mike Chen in St. Louis, Missouri. It's a Monday. I think this is a Midwestern thing. On Mondays, a lot of restaurants are not open. So I've been trying to explore the food scene as much as I can and been craving some Korean food. That's one thing St. Louis really doesn't have much of. Would you say the only Korean barbecue was? The only galbi was? Is that a taco? That's it. There's no even like a barbecue. Well, I found this place. We're gonna try this place out. This is called Fire Chicken. Okay, thank you. Should we get the red chicken gangjeong? And the fire chicken gangjeong? Can we get one of each? Is these two the best thing here? Everything is good? The fire is the signature, okay. Today's not just going to be a typical dining on the hood session. Since coming to St. Louis, I got lawn chairs. So I'll give you a tour. This is going to be the chairs and this is going to be our dining table. So the new and improved dining on the hood. Well, it's not on the hood anymore. Dining in the trunk. Food in the trunk. Chicken in the trunk. Dumplings in the trunk. Dumplings in the trunk. So we got the fire chicken. Wow. This is the red chicken. Do you miss Korean food? Like I know I'm only like 8% Korean, but I miss Korean food so much. Christine is 100% Korean. Is that true? These dumplings are great. They don't actually make the dumplings here, but then the lady was like you should still try them. They're delicious and they are. Wow. So this is the fire chicken with little crispies on top. Sesame and they put a little soy sauce on the rice as well. It's really good. Chicken is crispy. It's tender. It's spicy. Great kick. Sauce is delicious. The little crispies on top are fantastic. Not just for decoration. Completely changes the flavor profile of this chicken. Eat it with the rice. 100% satisfies your craving for some Korean fried chicken, for some Korean food. All the above. Craving satisfied. This one's nice. It looks spicier, right? I like it. I might like the gochujang better. I wish it was a little more spicy, but much more of an umami flavor here. Not as spicy, but flavor much stronger than the other one. This is a pretty good place. I mean, it's simple, but the food's delicious. The owner is super nice. Also, since we sat down, no one's even given us a second look. I think this is like kind of the norm here in Missouri, maybe. So in the Midwest, you got to get a custard. I don't know why this custard is so melted. We just got this. Even as they gave it to us, it was melted. I mean, it's super good, but it's just... It's not as melted. It's still pretty melted. Is this what a custard should be? It's supposed to be thick and not melted. It's so delicious. The car is definitely a mess. It has like hot oil on it, fried chicken. It looks like custard's on it now, so I'm gonna take it for a car wash. Yeah, that's pretty much what I'm doing every day here in St. Louis. Just looking for food and afterwards looking for more food that's more sweet. And at the end of the day, it is nice to come to the deck and sit around and that is 100% such a beautiful sunset. Anyway, the video you're about to see was actually filmed in Houston, Texas, I think maybe about four or five months ago. That was a good day. It was a day I realized an all-you-can-eat Vietnamese buffet actually existed. And before we get to that, a big shout out and thank you to CuriosityStream for sponsoring this video. CuriosityStream, of course, is a new sponsor. I've been trying them out for the past month. And guys, if you're into history, if you're into science, if you're into basically just learning, you're gonna love this. So CuriosityStream is a subscription streaming service that offers thousands of documentaries, non-fiction titles for some of the best filmmakers in the world, including exclusive originals. It's basically like Netflix for nerds or Hulu for history buffs. And it's extremely affordable, under $20 a year, $1.67 per month. I could have got like five months of this with the custard I just had. I've been watching this series called The History of Food, which is a CuriosityStream original. I'm a big history buff, of course. I'm a huge food lover. So this is perfect for me. Such a well-done documentary. Learn so much about the thing I love. But whatever you're into, food, science, space, engineering, civilization, the ocean, whatever you're into, there's something you're gonna like in this platform. CuriosityStream is available on a ton of platforms like web app, Roku, Android, Xbox, smart TV, iOS, Chromecast, Amazon Fire, Amazon Candle, Apple TV. Basically anywhere you watch things, you're gonna get access to it. They're available worldwide and they add shows every single week. So if you want to give them a try, go to curiositystream.com slash dumpling and you're gonna get unlimited access to the world's top documentaries and non-fiction series. And for you guys, use the promo code dumpling. You're gonna get 25% off. So that comes out to $14.99 per year. And I've been binging a ton of these shows because I don't just like to feed here. I like to also feed here. Although it may not seem like that, but I do. I mean, come on, $14.99 a year. That's like, what, like one month of Netflix? So go to that link and get your learn on. I feel like I've been in Missouri already too long. All right, I'm gonna sit here and enjoy the sunset and check out this all-you-can-eat Vietnamese buffet. Hey guys, it's Mike Chen here in Houston, Texas. If you know me, if you've been watching my videos for a while, you know I'm obsessed with buffets. I love buffets. I've loved buffets ever since I was a kid because my parents owned a buffet throughout most of my life. I was poor most of my life. That's also why I love buffets because I could just go in and just eat till I couldn't eat anymore. So buffet's been really kind of an important part of my life for as long as I can remember. And there's two types of buffets I really wanted to see that I'd never seen before. One was an all-you-can-eat Sichuan food buffet because I love Sichuan food. I'm always thinking like, what if there's like all-you-can-eat Chongqing spicy chicken or all-you-can-eat water-braised beef? That I haven't seen yet. The other buffet I always wanted was a Vietnamese buffet because I love Vietnamese food and I can eat pho forever. And here in Houston, Texas, I think this is the first time I've ever ran into something like this. All-you-can-eat Vietnamese buffet. I think Brenda was the first one who told me about this when she lived in Houston. I was just like, what, what, really? There's a Vietnamese buffet? It's here. Let's go inside. I don't know what that thing just sprayed on me. All right, first of all, this place is ginormous. Secondly, it hasn't even opened yet and a line already started forming. I mean, this is a weekday. So I hear on the weekend, this actually turns into like a dim sum buffet as well. Okay, this place for lunch is $15. Dinner is $24. And that's all the food that's here. All right, I'm here. I'm situated. Let's go check out the buffet. Of course, at a Vietnamese buffet, you have to have a noodle station. Whoa, look at all these noodles that are available. Bun bo wei. Bun bo wei is like the only thing I recognize here. Like I don't even know. Okay, let me come back to that. Let me see what else is here. Classic Vietnamese street food. Whoa, summer rolls. A lot of classic Vietnamese street food. Mostly I can't pronounce, so I'm not gonna try. You got spare ribs, steamed fish, noodles, spring rolls, whole fish, shrimp, fried chicken. This buffet is awesome. If I lived here, I would be in trouble because I'd be here almost every single day. I haven't tasted anything yet. I already know I'm gonna love this place. So this is a big round one for me. I got a lot of everything. Steamed fish with black bean sauce. That is tender. Remarkably tender piece of fish. Peppery. Love the fermented black beans. Like I said, there's a bunch of street food available as well. Here I got some banh xeo. Sorry for my troll pronunciation. I'm really really sorry. I'm also super excited. I didn't get any vegetables. You could get some herbs and lettuce to wrap it with. I didn't. I'm just gonna pour some fish sauce all over it. All the sprouts are all falling out. I'm such a messy eater. We're gonna have this. This is like the central Vietnamese omelet. This is a very popular street food item and I really miss having this. And here I get to have it as much as I want. The broccoli beef. Hold the broccoli. It's really good. Marinated beef shank. One of my favorite cold dishes. I kid you not. These are superb quality, really well-made food items. The shank, if you go to Chinatown New York, this stuff is about I think 12 to 16 dollars a pound. This stuff I think is like 12 to 16 dollars for maybe quarter of a pound or half a pound. And the quality here is amazing. By the way, it's about 15 minutes since this place opened. It's hot full already. I'm actually gonna kind of pick up my pace on eating. I don't love being in here with like a hundred other people, but I just want to give a huge shout out to this pig trotter. This is a buffet, but the quality is really blowing my mind. Like this is a really good pig trotter. If you give this to me in a dim sum basket and charge me like six bucks for one of these, I wouldn't complain to you. Totally forgot about this. So I got some bún bò huế. This is my first of hopefully many Vietnamese noodle soups that I will get for a buffet. This is a pretty darn good bún bò huế. Actually goes pretty good with my pig trotter. I can't imagine what this place is like on a weekend. And apparently on weekends, they have unlimited crawfish. I do not want to be here for that. I really don't. I mean I do, but I don't. If you never fought with Asians for seafood before, it's not something you want to be involved with. I have no idea what this is. I think this is some sort of mushroom and shrimp soup thing. Oh. It's like a little tom yum tasting mushroom and shrimp dish. This might be a little too much for a lot of people. This is hóngshāo ròu. So braised fatty pork belly. If you ever go to Taiwan and go to the museum, there's actually a piece of jade shaped just like a fatty piece of pork. Proving even more so that this is the food of the gods. They cook this so well. The skin just melts in your mouth. Can't believe I'm eating a $14 buffet right now. I can't believe this thing exists. No wonder people are here like before it opens. And this is a Thursday. Get yourselves one of these fried pork chops. It's still crispy on the outside. Although I feel like I pretty much did two rounds already. Let's sit back for more. Next up, just a bunch of Vietnamese street food. This is a sticky rice dumpling. I think it's shrimp and mashed taro inside. It's not bad. Now, I think this is bánh bò lọc. It's a clear pork and shrimp dumpling. Oh, that's good. I'm not even gonna try to pronounce this. I'll get it wrong. But this is like steamed rice cake with coconut. This is so good. Did I not have this while I was in Vietnam? If not, that would have been a shame. Crazy soft steamed rice with subtly sweet coconut flavor mixed in. And on top of it, it's just little pieces of dry shrimp. And also there's shaved coconut on top too. This is something I was really excited about. This is a minced crab noodle soup and of course pieces of blood in here as well. There's a hint of sweetness in this as well because of all the crab meat that's in here. They mix the crab meat with bits of pork. It's also a really tomatoey noodle soup. This is fantastic. I like this more than the bánh bò lọc. At least the way they cook it. All right, this place is getting really really really full. So I'm gonna go sneak maybe a couple more rounds really quick and I'm gonna get out of here. We'll talk about it outside. Even though I'm sitting by the window in the corner, I still don't feel great about being in a restaurant full of people. So I had to sneak out early, but that's a good place. It had basically everything I want when it came to Vietnamese food. Obviously, the noodle soup is not going to be as quality as places that just do that and have been making soup every single day for years, but it's good quality. And I was especially impressed with a lot of dishes like the fried pork chop was amazing, the marinated beef. That's one of my all-time favorite foods. Incredibly tender. Pig trotter is great. The only thing they don't have a lot of is dessert. So I didn't even bother eating any dessert. So I came out here. I'm gonna go grab some egg tarts or something and definitely I've not been here for dinner. But I imagine, I mean like I keep emphasizing this today. It's a Thursday at 11 o'clock and it's full. It is packed. I can't only imagine how crazy it is at nighttime. We're on the weekends when they have dim sum and like all you can eat crawfish. I don't want to be here for that. I mean I again like I do but not till all this craziness is over. I wouldn't feel comfortable being here for that. But all the stuff that I had for the price of $15. That is a really good deal. So yeah, if you're a buffet lover like myself, highly recommend you come check this place out. All right, speaking of the dessert we're talking about. Let's go get some. Oh, they got wife's cake. I love wife's cake. That's a good egg tart. Oh, this is just extreme flake, whatever you do never give these egg tarts any responsibility ever. This is extremely flaky. Egg tart with tea. This is a wife cake. It's a really flaky pancake with I think it's lotus seeds inside. This is a good bakery. My last day in Houston, I just wanted to kind of end the day a bit early and just come back. This is really nice area right by my hotel. I've been eating a lot for a lot of days. So today is just going to be running around detoxing a bunch. I'm actually right now in Taylor, Tyler, Texas. And this is sort of on the way back to Dallas. It's a place about two hours east of Dallas. And this is one of the most famous barbecue places in Texas. Like I told you eating barbecue in Texas is like going to pizza joints in New York. There's so many of them and there's so many good ones. And this is apparently one of the best and it's in this little town. They just opened about 15 minutes ago. It's about half full already. So, of course, I'm trying to eat at all the best barbecue places in Texas. And it's not really on the way home from Houston, but it kind of works. Whoa, that's a lot of bread. Is there anything under the bread? Oh, there is. There we go. We got some pulled pork, some ribs that people say is the best in Texas. Also chicken thighs, boneless chicken thighs. Oh my gosh, here we go. The brisket and the sausage. So this is a cheddar jalapeno sausage. And these are, they gave me a bunch of end pieces. I asked for a lot of end pieces and fatty pieces of the brisket. Wow, I'm just trying to take a piece out and I'm having trouble doing it because it's not staying on my fork. Let's start out with the meat that's lowest on the barbecue hierarchy. Chicken thighs. That's good chicken. I think it needs some sauce though. And I was looking for the sauce where they put it. I didn't realize this is the barbecue sauce. Every one of these Texas barbecue places I go to just has remarkable sauce. The chicken, I don't know why I keep getting barbecue chicken. I mean, they're good. They're flavor good, but they're never really juicy. Oh, that is good pulled pork. It's like eating meaty cotton candy. Wow, that might be the most tender pulled pork I've had so far in Texas. This is so freaking good. If I could buy this in stores, I will have a freezer full of this sausage. The casing is so snappy. The meat just tastes soft like a lullaby while holding an incredible amounts of cheese and kick. One of the best sausages I've had in World War II. Of course, brisket. You barely need to chew this. This almost kind of looks like a papier-mâché. The meat just coming apart. Look at this beautiful smoke ring. Gorgeous outside crushed. The smoke flavor is off the charts and the number one thing is just how remarkably tender that is. The brisket and the pulled pork, keyword tenderness. Wow, I would drive back two hours from this place. That is so good. I mean, I haven't had this yet. So apparently they're known for their ribs. Can't imagine because their pulled pork and brisket is already so good, but they're known for their ribs. These are probably the most unique ribs I've had in Texas barbecue so far because usually the ribs I had, this gives off a really subtle sweet flavor and it's so much smoke. And yeah, it's still a little peppery, like sweet and peppery, but it's mostly sweet I would say. These are excellent. If I still have to rank my favorites, sausage, brisket, pulled pork. Best things here. Those three things would 100% get me to come back, especially this. I noticed on a sign they said they had these today. So maybe they don't have them every single day. Come when they have these. Can't stop eating it. This is definitely one of the best barbecue places I've been to in Texas. Oh, also after eating a bunch of the brisket, this is the best brisket I had in Texas. I'm going to try to summarize my barbecue experience so far in Texas. The best ribs I've had, I think, was at Snow's. Best brisket I've had, probably here. Best sausage I've had, definitely here. Best beef rib, I only had one at Terry Black's, which is amazing. I love their beef ribs so much. Terry Black, I feel like they just do everything really, really well. It's consistent. It's delicious. It's like, it's like somebody that's good at everything. Oh, also their smoked turkey's excellent. This place just has more items where I'm kind of going gaga over. That sausage, especially. I wonder if I should just go and buy more sausage because I want to bring some with me to Dallas. Oh, I gotta pack up. Yeah, it's raining. All right, back in Dallas. One final meal. This is going to be a doozy. So Vietnamese food, obviously really popular in Texas, and this place... Remember the giant catfish I got in Seattle? Oh, they got it here, too. All right, this one is a little different than the one I had in Seattle, mainly. That skin is so crispy. They bake it here. This is like Peking duck skin. Oh. That's almost exactly like Peking duck skin. Melts in your mouth. Wow, that's fatty, too. You get some fat between the skin and the meat, and the best way to eat this, take a rice wrapper, and look how tender this catfish is. Put that on there. Add a bit of skin, some veg herbs, some noodles. Wrap it up. I think this is the neatest I've ever wrapped one of these rice spring rolls. Dip it in the sauce. Awesome. This might be the best version of this dish I've had. That skin is the complete game changer. What sets this place apart than all the other places I've been to. A skin, you will find a Peking duck or a crispy roasted pork. It just completely changes the texture. Makes it so much better. Gives it a borderline addictive quality. I'm gonna put this on the must-try list. And as always, all the places I went to, down below for you. Thank you all so much for watching. Until we eat again, see you later.