Maya's world buffet and bar, Southend: an interesting buffet venue with the usual limitations

29th July 2014
Somewhat belatedly, I am catching up with my eating, and am gratified by the number of hits this blog has had, even if they are bots.
We had clocked Maya's some time ago. It is in the row of restaurants on the London Road, close to the top of the High Street in Southend. Somewhat unusually, it is upstairs with the entrance round a corner in College Way, unashamedly proposing that this could be cheap grub for students at the Ivy League university round the corner. There is a helpful web site at http://www.mayasrestaurant.co.uk/ with their own pictures that give a good flavour of the place. It is a fixed price of £12.95 during the week for dinner, and somewhat cheaper at lunchtime and a bit more expensive at the weekend. The price is fair and does not include drink which is realistically priced. The idea is that it offers a geographically diverse choice of popular dishes, and you can mix and match even on the same plate. So you can have pizza and curry or sushi and tacos. You get the idea. It is a good place for kids as there is bound to be something for everyone, but probably not a good idea to let them help themselves. This is not smart or pretty dining, and plates of food do not have significant visual appeal. As with most buffets, it pays to keep an eye on what is coming to an end or being replaced as the new dishes tend to be hotter and fresher (obviously).

Tureens showing various degrees of emptiness

Starter plate

There is a station where you can have mixtures of vegetables and meats stir fried with spices. Rather like a Mongolian barbecue but with less variety. The cook did not look happy in his work

What you get off the stir fry: this is hot

round 2 with chicken tikka masala and Thai red curry

The above is representative, and does not show you the sushi station and the taco station. The variety is interesting and the food is plentiful, fairly well cooked and of reasonable quality. It has the usual buffet problems of food never being more than CHOF 7 and unless you are very disciplined, you may be up and down to the buffet so often that there are gaps in conversation. The desert bar was interesting for not only having the standard stuff that you might get at a Chinese buffet, but also having profiteroles and a chocolate fountain. High risk especially with children around.

Would I go again? Probably. It is not as good as East a few hundred meters away which is almost exclusively Oriental, but for an evening meal it is a very good price for as much or as little as you want of what you want. Service is up to you.