Shinara Grill & Lounge, Sydney CBD

 A while back, the healthy trio of Pat, Patty and myself, ventured to Shinara Grill & Lounge (Shop 1, 338 Pitt Street, Sydney) for some all you can eat Korean BBQ (our fave). We headed over from uni, via some well deserved drinks at the roundhouse and entered the restaurant's peculiar foyer area all buzzing and raring to go.

Happy Hour is the way to go

Foyer Area

 

Winners

 

 

 We were seated and given three sets of cutlery (including 5 plates) with additional plates costing $2 each (I'm pretty sure it's to avoid grabbing a tonne of food all at once which can lead to wastage, but please ... as if lack of plates would stop me from eating more). Fortunately, Shinara Grill & Lounge doesn't hold a time limit policy for the buffet but nevertheless we only ended up staying for around one and a half hours.

The not so authentic portable gas stove & grill top

 We'll begin with some photos of the buffet selection. It's probably worth mentioning that the dinner buffet is a measly $21 a head but there's no doubt that you pay for the quality that is provided. I dare say ... everything here is safe to consume; all the pre cooked food looks a little sloppy nestled inside the buffet styled dish heater. As for the frozen meats, the lack of signage and intense neon lighting didn't help with its appeal. But honestly, how can you say 'no' to the piece of meat that sort of looks like pork belly or the floating object needing to be saved from the supposedly dark marinade.

 

I can confirm that on the bottom left hand corner
are pieces of cut, tubed sausage.

 

 

I didn't dare go there



Or here either

 The precooked food was average, but by this time all the drinks had kicked into our system and any sort of food would have been tasty. They also had a selection of the typical Korean side dishes to accompany the BBQ. But there was hardly any point in filling ourselves up on the 'cheap' food, we were there to turn our hard earned $21 into an investment by eating Shinara Grill & Lounge to the ground via a meat marathon.

Some sort of soggy 'fried' chicken

Dipping Sauces



A compilation of Korean sides

 We were being careful not to mix the beef and pork together as shown below...

Tidy separation

 The meat itself really wasn't too bad at all and there was a large selection to match as well. Due to the lack of signage I can't really specifically tell you the ones which were better than the others but I think the best way to go about things is to give everything a go because it's all part of the experience! In the hazy state we were all in, we put anything on the plate, came back to the table and chucked it all on, then ate whatever looked cooked off the grill.

Meat
so vague



Meat x2

 The pork belly ended up being my favourite of the night even though it was essentially like grilling up slabs of fat, but that alone kept me going back for more. Super tasty + super fatty = a happy bunnyblogger. The fat from the pork turned the grill into more of a grease trap but ingeniously there is a hole in the grill plate that allows the oil to fall into a paper cup provided there by staff.

Pork Belly
my heart hurts just looking at it; not because I miss it,
but because it was so greasy

 

 

The grill gets a little bit charred up and I think it costs $2
to get a fresh one even though it's an OHS hazard

 We ended the night with a short walk to Noggi on George Street for some of my favourite green tea frozen yoghurt. In hindsight I don't think I'd go back again if I had a choice of Korean BBQ in the city but in saying that, it's not a bad place to visit if you're just that little bit drunk because all that grease is bound to hit some sort of spot. For this reason (as it suited the night) I gave it an extra carrot, because I'm just that nice of a guy =)

PS. they only let you keep your gas stove on medium heat and it gets pretty annoying when they keep coming past making sure that you haven't muddled with their preferred settings. On the medium heat, it kind of stews the meat a little bit instead of giving it that nice crisp outside.

 

 

Bunny Rating-