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One such place is Wokmania, situated on West Street, just outside of the City Centre, in an area which is popular with Students.
Wokmania is actually a chain of Buffet Restaurants with outlets in Birmingham, Newcastle, Leeds, Doncaster, Brighton, and my local Restaurant in Sheffield. ... Read review
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Advantages: Good Value For Money Disadvantages: Not Very Authentic, 10% Gratuity Charge Included In Bill
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One such place is Wokmania, situated on West Street, just outside of the City Centre, in an area which is popular with Students.
Wokmania is actually a chain of Buffet Restaurants with outlets in Birmingham, Newcastle, Leeds, Doncaster, Brighton, and my local Restaurant in Sheffield. Wokmania is a Limited Company that has been trading since ???with its head offices in Halifax, West Yorkshire.
This particular review ... ...I have not visited any of their Restaurants in other locations.
The first thing that you will notice when you enter the place is the decor. It is very bright and spacious, and open plan with tables set out around the perimeter of the room and the food on display in the middle of the room.
As you enter there is a small Bar located to the left of the entrance and new arrivals are instructed by a sign to wait here to be ... more
Chinese style "all you can eat" Buffets certainly seem to be the thing where I live in Sheffield at the moment. There have been two well-established places in the City Centre for about 5 years now, which have both proved to be very popular. However in the past couple of years there has been to my knowledge at least a further three such places appear on the outskirts of the City Centre.
One such place is Wokmania, situated on West Street, just outside of the City Centre, in an area which is popular with Students.
Wokmania is actually a chain of Buffet Restaurants with outlets in Birmingham, Newcastle, Leeds, Doncaster, Brighton, and my local Restaurant in Sheffield. Wokmania is a Limited Company that has been trading since ???with its head offices in Halifax, West Yorkshire.
This particular review is based largely on my local outlet in Sheffield, since I have not visited any of their Restaurants in other locations.
The first thing that you will notice when you enter the place is the decor. It is very bright and spacious, and open plan with tables set out around the perimeter of the room and the food on display in the middle of the room.
As you enter there is a small Bar located to the left of the entrance and new arrivals are instructed by a sign to wait here to be allocated a table. We visited on a Monday night when the place was less than half full, and we were located a table almost immediately.
We ordered drinks at the table and then scurried off to the Buffet to stuff our faces.
If you visit at Lunchtime between 12 noon and 5pm the Buffet menu costs only £5.50, but after 5pm a more extensive menu called the Grand Buffet is available. This costs £9.99 and is available until 11pm.
THE LUNCHTIME BUFFET
Typical dishes available as Starters at Lunchtime include Chinese Soup (Chicken & Sweetcorn Soup or Vegetable Hot & Sour Soup are both examples of what I have seen).
Other Dishes include Samosas (Chicken, Meat and Vegetable), Spare Ribs, Chicken Wings, Spring Rolls, Sesame Prawn Toast, Seaweed, and Prawn Crackers.
The Main Course dishes are fairly extensive and include Chicken Balls with Sweet & Sour and Lemon Sauce, Lemon Chicken, Chinese Chicken Curry, Red Thai Beef Curry, Malaysian Chicken Curry, Chicken Terayaki, Lamb Rogan Josh, OK Chicken, Kung Po Chicken, Chicken Satay, Chicken Tikka Massala, Sweet & Sour Chicken, Beef in Black Pepper Sauce, Sweet Chilli Sauce, and Crispy Beef.
As you would expect there is also an extensive range of Rice and Noodles available. These include Chow Mein, Egg Fried Rice, Boiled Rice, Special Fried Rice, Mushroom Foo Yung, Stir Fried Rice, Sweet & Sour Cabbage, Chilli Leeks, Stir Fried Cauliflour, Stir Fried Garlic Beansprouts, Garlic Mushrooms, Onions in OK Sauce, and for us not so authentic customers, Chips.
The Salad Bar includes Fresh Vegetables such as Lettuce, Tomatoes, Beetroot, Cucumber, and Coleslaw.
Finally there is a good range of Desserts also available. These include Cakes, Jelly, Fresh Fruit (Oranges and Apples), Rice Pudding, Fritters (Pineapple, Banana, Apple), plus Ice Cream and Sauces.
The Bar is fully licensed and has a selection of Bottled Beers, Spirits, and a selection of Wines. Soft Drinks are available on a self service basis from machines at the side of the Buffet.
THE GRAND BUFFET
This features all of the same dishes that are available at the Lunchtime Buffet plus a selection of further dishes including Aromatic Crispy Duck, Spring Onion & Shredded Cucumber, Chicken in Sweet Chilli Sauce, Beef in Peking Sauce, Thai Hot Sour Fish, Chicken Jalfrezi, Beef in Chilli & Mango, Chicken Korma, Zeera Chicken, Chicken Madras, Lamb Madras, and Thai Green Chicken Curry.
The Desserts menu is pretty much the same as the Lunchtime menu with the addition of a Chocolate Fountain with Marshmallows.
GENERAL INFORMATION
If you are drinking Soft Drinks then these are all the same price and re-fills are free, you simply pay for your empty Glass.
There is a maximum stay rule of 2 hours, which is enforced at busy periods.
MY THOUGHTS
Overall I really enjoy this place but if I am to be critical it would be to say that there seems to be more and more non-Chinese dishes appearing on the menu each time I visit and if this continues they may need to re-market this Restaurant as a Chinese/Indian/Thai Buffet.
I have also found that if you visit this place during busy periods the Food is generally hotter and new dishes of Fresh Food are constantly being brought out, whilst at less busy times the turnover of Food is obviously slower and some dishes can be luke-warm.
My penultimate moan is actually about the atmosphere of the place, as basically there is isn't much of one. On each of my visits there has not been a Chinese Waiter in sight, most Staff are English/European Students, and there is absolutely nothing remotely Chinese about the decor of the place. Having said that the place is spotlessly clean, including the toilets, and it is very disabled friendly. In fact during my most recent visit there was at least one customer in a wheelchair, who did not seem to have any difficulty.
I have saved my final grip however until last, and that is that a 10% gratuity charge is automatically added to your bill, there is an option to refuse to pay this, but I doubt very much that many people do.
AND FINALLY......
Wokmania is located at the following address:
Wokmania 137 West Street, Sheffield, S1 4EW
Telephone: 0114 275 5885
They are open 7 days a week from 12 noon until 11pm.
micksheff 20.09.2006 (20.09.2006)
Ciao members have rated this review on average:
very helpful
Review of Wokmania, Sheffield
Value for Money
Standard of Menu
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Family Friendly
Quick review of Wokmania, Sheffield
Why do we want to visit a restaurant with substandard food? The service is non-existent, the food extremely spicy (not Chinese at all), the staff indifferent and the price on the high side. Service charge is for service, try asking for anything! It was excellent a year ago. I will never go back to this second rate non descript eatery. ...
Howardc 06.07.2007 (05.07.2007)
Ciao members have rated this review on average: helpful Review of Wokmania, Sheffield
Advantages: self service buffet style, good environment, easy access Disadvantages: bad food quality, slow service, hidden 10% gratuity charge
Wokmania is a Chinese food buffet restaurant on West Street in town.
I've been 3 times with various friends and found very variable standards.
On the positive side, i would say the environment at wokmania is good - the large tv's are often on showing fun programmes like takeshi's castle - and it's always been clean whenever i've been.
The buffet style means there is always something you'll eat whether vegetarian or not. Most of the food is Chinese ... ...is well set out and there's plenty of seats although for the evening meal it can be busy. Usually it is quite quiet at lunch time. The best relatively new addition is a chocolate fountain, which is included in the buffet bill.
On the negative side, there's a10% Gratuity charge for what can only be considerd very little service. They send you to a table and some other people tidy up occasionally. Being a buffet it's self service including getting ...
studentfreespirit 25.02.2008
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: helpful Review of Wokmania, Sheffield
Advantages: Cheap all you can eat meal, convenient location Disadvantages: Cold food, 10% service charge
I have been to both of the other Chinese buffets in Sheffield city centre and have been pleased with the variety and quality of the food on offer. So having read Ciao reviews on Wokmania decided to give it a go for lunch yesterday.
On walking in was pleased to see a clean, smart modern looking restaurant. We were shown to our table and asked for our drinks order. Since we both had to work in the afternoon we ordered two soft drinks. We were not ... ...refillable, we only realised this when we saw others refilling their empty glasses. We did not manage a refill however since the drinks machine broke ten minutes into our visit. I understand that these things happen and customers waiting for drinks were reassured that the problem would soon be rectified. However, when we left after an hour there were still no drinks and customers were still being told the problem was getting fixed. There was no offer ...
fluffcat 30.09.2006
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: helpful Review of Wokmania, Sheffield
Advantages: Self service Disadvantages: Ice cream wasnt ready but that took 5 mins
I went here for a friends 18th birthday don't live in sheffield but very near.... i loved it ive been to a chinese restraurants and had a set dish and a desert and paid alot more... i paid £13.60 and could have as much of the mixture of dishes that i want.... drinks refill help yourself... i found this better as if you have got a waiter and the restaurant is busy then you have to wait your turn where as here you get as much as you want when you want... ...
esthagorratena 18.03.2008
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: helpful Review of Wokmania, Sheffield
Value for Money
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Standard of Service
Quick review of Wokmania, Sheffield
this place is shite.the food is severd half cold.service is none excistant.i have visited this place twice now and on both occasions have been very dissapointed.i wont be visiting again and will not reccomend anyone to visit ...
ritchie1504 09.11.2008 (08.11.2008)
Ciao members have rated this review on average: somewhat helpful Review of Wokmania, Sheffield
