food is top-notch, and wide selection. mongolian food…read moregalore, and tasty too. the staff is very attentive, pleasant, and courteous... i bring friends to show how much i enjoy sum's bbq... so eager to eat, forgot my phone for photos... pleasant atmosphere for a bbq...

All You Can Eat-ish... Bar-B-Que…read more.. I was excited to find out there was a Mongolian BBQ in Auburn. For weeks, my coworker and I have been trying to get our schedules lined up so we can go try it out together. Finally, tonight was that night. We parked in a large parking lot around the corner and noticed it was not busy. One of the employees was sitting outside (outdoor seating is available) on his phone, but he was so welcoming and opened the door for us. He took us to a booth and gave us the run down. Sit. Order your drinks, and go get food. Go back for more, because it's ayce... Tony was really nice and had a great smile! He told us how it works - The server would be over to get out drink order. Then, she brought us some crispy wonton chips with some sweet & sour, a cup of soup each, and a small bowl of rice to share... although there are signs that say "do not share," lol. I'm not sure why you can't share if everyone is paying the same price and eating almost the same exact thing... especially, if it's ayce for everyone... It was exciting to see what they had to offer. After finishing the soup, we walked around the wall to fill your bowl with meats (choice of pork, chicken, beef, or lamb), noodles, vegetables, and at the very end, the flavorful liquid. These liquids make your dish. You can put on a simple teriyaki, but that will make it sweet. There is a house sauce, sesame oil, soy sauce, ginger, wine, vinegar, and kung pao sauce. If you aren't sure what you like, there is a "Sum's Sauce Recommendation" recipe up for your convenience. **Be sure to tip the grill cooks!! The best way I have noticed to do this is to grab 2 bowls. One of for your food and the other, you will want to fill to the at least half way with your liquids. The saucier the better with me! I spoke to the cashier in the front... who told me it's $21 to dine in, and $17 to take it to go since the person taking theirs to go wouldn't be ayce.... (never mentioning the extra charge.) When we sat down, it felt like something in it was missing... maybe a little salt? Usually, I nail my own sauce recipes. Good amount of soy sauce, sesame oil, ginger... garlic, chili oil... a little kung pao... Since we weren't too happy with the flavor of our first bowl, and finished just over half... and this was an ayce... we decided to go back and tweak our creation. This one had better flavor (I added A LOT of soy sauce, ginger, and sesame oil), but I seriously could still not taste the sesame oil and this trip, and I used a lot (is there such thing as sesame water?). Then, I wondered if they were using low sodium soy sauce (i asked, and it was regular). I'm wondering if all these sauces are watered down since the soy sauce and ginger sauce were lacking major flavor. The sesame oil couldn't even be detected... so either it is old or a not so good brand. I figured I would just take the rest home and fix up the flavor... and since I overheard a server offer to box someone's meal up...I thought that was neat that we were able to take out food home...turns out... we had to pay to take home the rest of our bowls(extra$9), or pay extra to not take it home... a "waste" charge(extra$8). When we first walked in and we asked how this Mongolian BBQ worked, they left out the part about paying for waste/ or taking home the rest of your food for a charge. If we had not gone back for a 2nd bowl, we would not have had to pay the extra charge because we would've just not finished it and left. I felt a little ripped off. Of course, after we were ready to pay, they pointed to the sign on the wall that we did not see... in fairness, we did ask how they operated and we were told to go get more... but we were not told about the extra charge. I felt cheated. Over all, it was not bad, it just was not good. It was edible, but definitely not worth the extra charge.. i didn't even want to bring it home, but with the extra charge, I figured I would fix it up at home to make it taste better. This brought our bill to close to $60... $30 split each. Not worth it. I feel like a great honest business that is confident in what they serve would have been up front about the charges before springing them on you in the end. They even brought us the bill without the extra charge when they noticed we were close to finishing, but then took the check back to add on the extra charge. The signs should have been pointed out. Service was great. Food was not anything to be excited about. Day after, I warmed up my food with a few drops of a sesame oil that I have.. it added 10 times more flavor than the 2 ladles of soy sauce and 3 ladles of sesame oil that I added at this restaurant.