Nearly two years after Ryan's Steakhouse closed its Hixson restaurant, the 10,994-square-foot restaurant has reopened as a hibachi grill buffet-style restaurant known as the Crazy Buffet.
The new restaurant at 5104 Hixson Pike is a Chinese and Japanese eatery with four hot bars, a salad bar, a sushi bar with about 25 available types, and a hibachi grill. Diana Chen, who owns and operates the new restaurant along with her husband Qing Di Chen, said their family owns similar restaurants in Orlando and Daytona Beach, Fla.
Crazy Buffet at 5104 Hixson Pike is a Chinese and Japanese eatery with four hot bars, a salad bar, a sushi bar with about 25 available types, and a hibachi grill.The new Hixson restaurant seats up to 396 patrons. It offers a lunch buffet for $7.59 and a dinner buffet for $9.99 (drinks are separate and cost $1.89 each), along with a number of food items that may be ordered off the menu. The restaurant also offers a 10 percent discount for seniors and military veterans.
Crazy Buffet opened for the first time Saturday and Chen said she hopes to have a grand opening ceremony in the next week.
"Business has been good - better than we expected so far," Chen said. "We believe in this area because you don't have a bigger buffet than what we offer here. We'll be able to bring more variety of foods for people."
Some of the buffet items will change with special items at different times of the year, Chen said.
Crazy Buffet will have about 15 employees, Chen said, and will be open seven days a week. Hours are from 11 a.m. until 10 p.m. Monday through Thursday and from 11 a.m. Until 10:30 p.m. on Friday and Saturday.
The restaurant building was erected in 2001, but Ryan's closed the Hixson site in February 2016 as part of a restructuring by its parent company.
The building was sold to Bill Raines of the Raines Group near the end of 2017 for $1.5 million.
Raines put a new roof on the building and rebuilt the parking lot, while the restaurant owners have put in new kitchen equipment, fixtures, tables and chairs.
Contact Dave Flessner at dflessner@timesfreepress.com or at 757-6340.