675 West Central Ave.
Springboro, OH 45066
937.743.0888
website
As many years as it has stood in Springboro, China Garden Buffet has been a spot for inexpensive eats, and an all-you-can-eat Chinese dive that attracts plenty for its quantity of dishes. You can get a variety of dishes here — sushi, chicken dishes and seafood as well as plenty of veggies — to try on that buffet. It brings in a decent crowd from Franklin and Springboro for cheap eats, but leaves something to be desired.
Some of the dishes I tried on the menu here:
- Hot and sour soup: A thick appetizer served with whole mushrooms and thick cut veggies. Nice but a bit bland.
- Crab Rangoon: The Rangoon are small and filled with cream cheese, but could use a bit of crab or some veggies to even it out.
- General Tso’s Chicken: Pretty run of the mill as far as the dish goes, overwhelmingly sweet but not spicy. Popular, of course, at the buffet.
- Peanut butter chicken: I like this dish for its sauce. Crispy thin cuts of chicken with a heavy peanut butter sauce. A small amount is plenty.
- Teriyaki chicken: Served on a skewer but still very tender inside with a bit of a crisp outside.
- Garlic chicken: Served heavy with broccoli and grilled chicken, the garlic sauce has a lingering flavor.
- Lo mein: The noodles are heavy with veggies and they go great with many other dishes. Again, though, the heat lamp can dry them out.
- Sushi: The rolls of sushi here are all simpler appetizer dishes, but there are a few fried and many served up with crab stick or shrimp inside. Look at each roll as it is.
- Wings: Jumbo and extra crispy. They don’t come with a sauce on their own, but these wings are great with with many other sauces the shop offers.
- Mussels: These mussels are cooked well, but some of them can be overcooked in the heat lamps.
- Veggie balls: These fritters are filled with vegetables, though they can be overcooked.
- Sesame balls: Filled with a thick dough to be different from the traditional recipe, but these balls are still very tasty.
The menu here is good for the variety of things in the buffet, but the main problem is the restaurant will hold things under those heat lamps and they’ll dry out. You have to wait on some things to ensure you get them fresh; sometimes they dry out. And some of the other things are either frozen or out of a bag.
All in all its an inexpensive option for food, but with a ton of other great Chinese food places in this part of town, this one doesn’t stand out.
Recommendations
- The buffet is cheapest at lunch.
- Chicken dishes are great but seafood is so-so. Wait for it to be fresh.
- The sushi here is also decent.
Another Food Critic 