Dragon Pearl Restaurant

We came here around noon on a Wednesday for the lunch buffet, and there was plenty of seating available, but it got really busy shortly after.nnAll drinks other than water are an extra charge.nnThe food was fairly decent. The Peking duck was the one we most enjoyed. You need to line up and get the item from the station handed to you by the staff, but they're pretty quick and will give you two portions or two pieces of duck on one wrap if you ask for it. The skin was crispy!nnLots of other items to choose from for lunch, including sushi rolls, western style breakfast eggs, bacon, etc, lots of Chinese food meats and veggies, dim sum, salads, fruit, lots of desserts and ice cream I enjoyed the green tea flavour mousse cake and ice cream.nnI would be interested in coming back to try their dinner menu at some point.nnService was good and they're quick to clear your plates. Paying with cash will give you an 8% discount.

I used to come here often at lunch time when I was in elementary school and it had just opened, and it was great value and I really enjoyed it. Since then, it seems to have gotten worse and increased their prices such that it isn't good value. That being said, it's one of the better buffets out there.nnI recently visited for a friend's birthday dinner and another time for lunch. Luckily, neither of the times were too busy. The highlights are that there was peking duck, an abundance of salmon sashimi, and some decent stir fry dishes. There were many disappointments though, like the dumplings, dim sum, and especially the roast beef since it was extremely salty.

This was a bit of a surprise. When Dragon Pearl first opened years ago, there was nothing like it. The atmosphere, the food, value for money was all top notch. In comparison the other all you can eat Chinese restaurant chain seemed stale and dated. You can tell the owner put a lot of thought and money into this place and building its reputation. Things have sadly changed.nOne example is they used to have a soup station with a chef cutting freshly made noodles into this large cauldron. That beef soup was amazing! Over the years that chef became a quirky robot, hacking away at the noodles with a large chef knife. This was fun for to watch and the soup was still delicious. This time I went to that same area to get my soup and it just wasn’t there anymore. When I asked, one of the workers said “we don’t have that anymore, it wasn’t popular” That’s sad!nOkay what about the rest of the food? There’s noticeably much less selection than ever!nOkay well, how about the quality? Not near as good as it used to be. The Duck was dry and almost tasteless. The oyster was okay, I guess that’s why there was a lineup for them. The rest of the food I had was mediocre to just okay at best.nMy whole party felt this way including a friend from mainland China who ended up just not eating much at all. We hyped the buffet and she was genuinely excited to try it outnThis is so sad!nI sincerely hope Dragon Perl becomes less complacent, adds more variety, and most importantly improves the quality of their food. Good restaurants need to be consistent and speaking of that older chain I mentioned in the beginning, that one is consistently good. The atmosphere isn’t nearly as nice as Dragon Pearl though. So sad!!

I recommend making reservations, especially during the weekend as it is very busy. Friday's and Sunday's they feature all you can eat crab. There is a 90min time limit while seated. Buffet style Chinese food and all was great, and did not disappoint. I would definitely return. The service was rated 4 stars as I think they were understaffed, and very slow to refill our water and take our dishes away.

They are currently offering all you can eat oysters on weekdays Monday-Thursday dinner for $47 per person until mid June. They have 3 different types of oyster, raw, grilled garlic and mayo cheese. They have a good selection from the basics like fried rice to sashimi to charcuterie to peeking duck and more. The quality of the food was pretty good.nHowever, the lines for oysters and peeking duck were extremely long. Their seating area is quite big but the area where you grab food is on the smaller side. So it was very packed. We went on a Thursday night and they actually ended up running out of oysters. Which was disappointing, they did end up giving some people including us a discount but it wasn’t given to everyone. We just got lucky as my friend went to the oyster station just as they ran out.