Imperial Palace Seoul’s Manyo offers a Japanese food buffet in an interior that looks like a shogun’s mansion from the Edo Period. / Courtesy of Imperial Palace Seoul

By Kim Rahn

When imagining a buffet at a hotel, what comes to mind will probably be various cuisines from around the world.

But some hotels these days offer specific menu buffets, such as Japanese or Korean food only, providing an opportunity to sample the restaurants’ delicacies at an affordable price.

Imperial Palace Seoul’s Japanese restaurant Manyo presents Japanese Delicacies Buffet on weekends, serving sashimi, sushi and robadayaki from the live station along with salad maki, Japanese soup and seasonal appetizers.

Special sushi from Yume Sushi Corner, offered by Manyo’s head chef Kwon O-joon, is also available.

Customers can choose ingredients at the Robadayaki Corner, including sirloin steak, fish and vegetables. Fresh seasonal fruits, cakes and puddings are available as dessert.

All guests are offered a complimentary glass of wine and unlimited draught beer or soft drinks. During March, unlimited sake is available.



Lunch is priced at 95,000 won and dinner, 110,000 won. For more information, call 02-3440-8000.

The Millennium Seoul Hilton also offers a Japanese buffet at Genji on weekends and national holidays.

The buffet features a new sushi bar and teppanyaki tables. Guests can enjoy the dining in unique tatami rooms or other private rooms in an elegant and contemporary setting.

The lunch buffet is priced at 63,000 won for adults and 37,800 for children under 12, and dinner, at 66,000 won for adults and 39,600 won for children. For more information, call 02-317-3240.

Shunmi, the Novotel Ambassador Gangnam’s Japanese restaurant, also presents a weekend buffet.

The buffet features over 100 dishes prepared by chief chef Baek Hak-man with over 20 years of culinary experience.

Appetizers include wasabi salad and ginkgo, while the salad bar features over 10 varieties including yogurt salad with mixed vegetables. For sashimi and sushi, halibut, red croaker, salmon, tuna, eel, octopus, gray mullet and trout are available.

Fried rice, clam soup and gratin are available at a hot dish corner, while the teppanyaki corner offers mushrooms, onions, sprouts, sirloin, bacon, prawn and squid.

Lunch is available for 56,000 won and dinner, for 62,000 won. The restaurant has 130 seats with seven private rooms and five tatami rooms. For more information, call 02-531-6477.

For Korean food lovers, Sejong Hotel’s Korean buffet restaurant Elysee is a good choice.

The restaurant offers some 100 Korean cuisines in buffet style dining. About 70 percent of the dishes are traditional Korean, while the rest are fusion-style modern ones. A la carte and course menus are also available.

Throughout the year, Elysee presents a variety of special buffets using seasonal ingredients, such as a New Year’s rice cake festival, spring herbs festival, fall specialties and Christmas buffet. The restaurant has also undergone interior renovation, featuring a tile-roofed house and traditional Korean lanterns with red-and-blue silk shades, to add a more Korean touch.