Korean Veggie Buffet - Garobee

Garobee is a vegetarian and vegan-friendly buffet restaurant in Gangnam, Seoul. While Sanchon in Insadong is classy, unique, spacious and special occasion-worthy (with its 40,000won per person rates), Garobee is cozy, sweet and affordable. Though a decent meal can be got for under 8,000won in Seoul, an all-you-can-eat-vegetarian buffet for those ravenous days can be quite satisfying at Garobee at 15,000won.

Pretty glasses all in a row!

Garobee is quite easy enough to find. Take Gangnam station exit 11. Find CGV movies. Garobee is located behind the CGV in a small alley.

 There is decent salad bar with fresh veggies, fruits and kimchi of course,  and a special salad dressing each day. It was an interesting and quite tasty peppery pineapple dressing on the day we visited. The soup made with kelp was a bit hit with my younger one. As for me, i am stuck at "there is a smell associated with seaweed."

Though this item looks like a beef dish, it is made totally out of tofu seitan (Thanks VeganBeats! )with the bean paste, cabbage, onions, capsicums and sesame seeds. This is used as a gravy to top the rice. But it was good enough to eat it alone too.

Fried Tofu shells with rice filling.

This is one of my favorite food at Korea. So easy to make too.  Tofu (soya paneer) is widely used in cooking in Korean food. Tofu is quite versatile and marinates well and can be grilled, sauteed, fried and boiled. Thick triangle chunks of tofu is fried and cut half way on the inside of the base to make a shell. Then, flavored rice is then stuffed into the shell. The shell is quite soft and not so brittle as we would imagine it to be.

Deep fried golden veggies in tempura batter with sweet and sour sauce for the topping

The veggies- potatoes, sweet potatoes, pine mushrooms- were light and crisp while the tangy sauce was a nice accompaniment to it.

Noodles in Soy sauce

 Pardon the shake, i guess i was getting pretty hungry by this time!

Fake ham and cheese sandwiches

 The good thing about this place is that it does not only serve Korean food. There were these fake ham (tofu, again) and cheese sandwiches and potato fries with ketchup that my kids happily gobbled up! There were also some bread and a variety of spread for those picky eaters.

Silken tofu soup

 There was also this whole section dedicated to bibimbap. With a lot of sauteed veggies, pickled veggies, dried and cut seaweed and the red sauce with the option of white Korean rice or the more healthy brown rice.

Plum tea was yummy

 And I really enjoyed the refreshing  plum tea. Must find out if the store-bought ones are as good as this one...

Korean Dessert

The dessert was not fulfilling though, with just one Korean sweet. (Which has to be eaten with sugar on the side for us sweet-toothed Indians!)

Garobee is a good veggie place but i am told there is a better veggie buffet elsewhere with even more options... Will unearth it soon.