Sea Food Festival: Al Zahra Restaurant at Crowne Plaza Review

Place a Crown on that

Our expedition to bring you the ultimate seafood taste continues. This time we went to our first buffet of the festival at Al Zahra Restaurant in Crowne Plaza. Here are the dishes that left the largest impact on us.

What You Need To Know

Sea food buffet every Monday and Wednesday (SR 245) from 7-11:30 p.m.
Saudi food night every Sunday
Mexican night every Tuesday
International cuisine on all other days
À la carte menu for those who want to eat something else
Signs alluding to foods that may cause allergies for some people are available.
A diet option is offered: soup + salad (SR 170)
For kids under 5 years old the buffet is free, for kids from 5 to 10 years old it costs SR 122.
WIFI available

The redecorated restaurant was very elegant and the buffet was presented in a very appealing way with a station for salads, one for main dishes, another for live cooking, one for dessert and finally one for ice cream.

For the live cooking station, guests can choose the seafood they want to grill and watch the magic happen by the pro chef.

Squid Salad

Mushy squid intermingled with onions and green peppers and other veggies had a very tangy flavor. This dish is perfect for those who want to combine salads with sea food and like their food on the zesty side.

YumMeter: 5/5

Marinated Vs. Cold Shrimp

This is the festival’s first showdown between these two shrimp platters.. but you see the winner is obvious, marinated shrimp. The sauce the shrimp has been drenched in, not only makes it moist, but also enables it to explode with flavors. Hence leaving the cold shrimp platter very bland in comparison.

Marinated YumMeter: 5/5
Cold Shrimp YuMeter: 3/5

Smoked Salmon

The cold smoked salmon, fancily known as saumon fume, was properly seasoned.

The beautiful orange fish gently slides across your palette because of its softness and leaves you desiring more of the flavor.

YumMeter: 4/5

Hamour Curry

The tender fish swimming in the curry sauce was an o.k. dish. We just felt that the sauce was overpowering the delicate fish, so the latter was somewhat lost in the viscosity of the sauce.

YumMeter: 3.5/5

Spring Rolls

Yes, we realize this is a seafood review, but the spring rolls were just too good to miss. The veggie rolls were golden crisp with lush and well-spiced stuffing; because they are very tiny, we just kept popping in one after the other.

YumMeter: 5/5

Fish Cake

Fish burgers!!! Loved them!! They were very moist due to the sauce that covered them. It had a brilliant shade of red and gave off a smack of pepper as we bit into it, and that caused quite the pleasant surprise.

YumMeter: 5/5

Grilled Lobster, Shrimp and Salmon

For delectable barbeque sensation, try all of these. We would have liked them to be less chewy though, but the smoky fiesta made us forget about all that and just munch on more.

YumMeter: 4/5

Skewered Tandoori Fish

The Indian powder covering the soft bits of fish on a skewer is definitely a specialty of the restaurant. The spicy seasoning gives the meal delectable colors and heightens the flavor of the fish chunks.

YumMeter: 5/5