All you can eat buffet dinner at restaurant Le Temps at Hotel Granvia Kyoto

After spending some time at Aeon mall, we decided to go explore Kyoto station further. We bought some souvenirs, delicious green teas and snacks, and drooled at the food we found at the Kyoto Isetan department store basements. After a while, we started to get hungry and it was time to decide where we have dinner. When I was walking around, a promotional poster caught my eye. It said something about all-you-can-eat crab legs, so I was immediately won over.

After doing some more reading (Japanese is difficult!), I figured out that it was at the restaurant Le Temps at the Hotel Granvia Kyoto, which is connected to Kyoto station. On the poster, I read ル・タン (literally pronounced as ru-tan) and I looked around for a restaurant with a similar name for a long time. Little did I know that it was a French name. I almost thought that it was Chinese or something, because my last name looks almost the same in katakana. 

At the time, there was a special Hokkaido festival going on, so I got to sample some delicious food from that region. 

Appetizers

Appetizers fried skewers shrimp okra chicken marshmallows chocolate side dishes



Whenever I eat at an all-you-can-eat buffet, I always start with the small bites and snacks. The chocolate covered marshmallows were a mistake on my side, but it was just too hard to resist sticking some marshmallows in that glossy chocolate fountain. The picture can almost be named: "Delicious food on a stick". It was the first time that I tried the fried skewers (kushikatsu), which are famous in the Kyoto region. On the plate, there was fried shrimp, okra, and chicken. I also grabbed some side dishes: pickled vegetables and a raw salmon salad.  

I also tried this small bowl with raw octopus, mayonnaise, and a piece of tomato. It wasn't that bad. 


appetizer raw octopus mayonnaise a piece of tomato

I couldn't find any sushi besides this, so I grabbed some to share among ourselves (Did you notice that I always take things in three?). It is octopus caught in the Northern sea (near Hokkaido) and on top, a dollop of wasabi mayonnaise. 

octopus Hokkaido wasabi mayonnaise

Main course

It is finally time for the main course and I went to get some crab legs, beef, scallops, and some rice. The snow crab legs are long and thin, so there are no large chunks of juicy crab meat, even at the claws. Even though it was all-you-can-eat, I barely finished the plate I had. The crab legs were cold (I prefer hot ones) and there wasn't much flavor besides a bit of saltiness. The Hokkaido beef made on the teppanyaki plate on the other hand, was very delicious. I normally eat steak well-done, but cooked this way was fine for me too. I also got a plate with 2 grilled scallops. I wanted to eat some rice with all the meat and seafood, so I scooped up some of the Hokkaido Nanao pork butadon (pork rice bowl).  

 Hokkaido Nanao pork butadon beef teppanyaki snow crab legs scallops
snow crab legs all you can eat buffet dinner Kyoto station Japan

For the second round, I grabbed some scallops again (very delicious!), some of the grilled potatoes and corn from Hokkaido, the raw salmon salad again, a bowl of salmon eggs, a fish stew, penne (or was it rice cakes?) carbonara with shrimp, a piece of salmon, rice stuffed squid rolls, and more of the delicious buta-don.

scallops grilled potatoes corn from Hokkaido raw salmon salad salmon eggs ikura fish stew penne carbonara shrimp salmon rice stuffed squid rolls buta-don

The penne carbonara wasn't that special, but it would look too strange to just scoop up the shrimp, so I took some pasta with it. The fish stew was yummy, as the fish was soft and full of flavor.  

Let's have a closer look at the large bowl of soy sauce marinated Ikura (salmon eggs). The size of those were almost like small pearls. They just burst in my mouth. Because they are very salty, it is best to eat these with a bowl of rice.
 

The buta-don was made so deliciously that I had to get a second serving of that. The meat and the rice were very well-seasoned. The rice stuffed squid rolls (ika meshi) were nice too. Something I had never tried before. At the time, I wasn't sure if that piece of meat was chicken or salmon, but I think it is flash-fried piece of salmon.  







This is my second portion of Hokkaido beef with a dollop of garlic butter sauce. 


 Desserts

I left some room for dessert like always, but I regret getting so much rice and pasta, as they made me feel very stuffy. I started with some bakery items: a chocolate muffin and a red bean pastry roll.
 

This is a bowl with green tea pudding, covered with matcha powder and gold leaf bits. 


Then, I went to get some scoops of ice cream (my favorite dessert!): strawberry, cookies and cream, green tea, and the other green one, which I still don't know what it was. I saw that there were two green colored ice creams, so I just took both to make sure I got the green tea ice cream. Pistachio ice cream would not be bad either. But it turned out to be something strange. I am thinking it was some kind of vegetable or something. At least, the colorful sprinkles made it a bit better.   


I think this was a mango cheese cake and I got some fruit with it, as it felt like ages since I last ate fruit. I am used to eating fruit as dessert on a daily basis, so even a day without fruit feels weird. 


The refreshing, sour, and juicy fruit increased my appetite, so I went on a hunt for more cakes. I came back to the table with a pretty matcha cake roll filled with red bean and cream and a slice of chocolate cake.  


These shot glasses filled pudding looked really pretty, so I took three flavors back to share. The green tea pudding tasted the best. One of us went to get another shot glass of that.  


I was starting to get very full, but I wanted to squeeze in two more desserts. I saw this beautiful glass of jelly, fruit, and yogurt and I just had to try it out. It looked better than it tasted. I ended the meal with a ice cream cone that I filled myself with a cantaloupe melon soft serve ice cream. Not bad for a first timer and someone who wanted as less ice cream as possible. I was too full, but I still wanted a small taste of it.


So, what do I think?

I went there for the snow crab legs, but I fell for the Hokkaido beef, the scallops, and the Nanao pork.



Restaurant Le Temps at Hotel Granvia Kyoto
All you can eat buffet
lunch
weekdays 2,900 yen, weekend 3,500 yen
round 1 11:30-13:00
round 2 13:30-15:00

dinner
4,900 yen
round 1 17:30-19:00
round 2 19:30-21:00

*Due to some miscommunication, we ordered a glass of expensive champagne (600 yen), while we don't even drink alcohol that often. I hope that they will try to use some English (or just write it down on a note) to confirm that we really want to order it the next time. But since we were on vacation, we didn't mind it that much. The champagne tasted quite nice (not too sweet or too bitter/sharp). Coffee/tea and softdrinks are included in the price.    




Popular Posts