The latest Chinese restaurant to open in Covington features among other things a large chandelier, a hibachi cook and a wide range of Sushi offerings.

Located in the old Shoney's building on Turner Lake Road, Hong Kong King Buffet celebrated its grand opening several weeks ago. Since taking over the building, the owners of the restaurant have completely retrofitted the interior, installing elaborate paned glass doors and wooden backed booths with exotic animals painted on the sides.

"Everything's new," said Ann Zheng, manager of the Hong Kong King Buffet. "Basically, we remodeled the whole building."

According to Zheng, Hong Kong King Buffet is one of the oldest Chinese restaurant franchises in Georgia and has several other locations throughout the Metro Atlanta area, including restaurants in Conyers, Norcross and Gainesville.

"We've been here for almost 10 years," Zheng said.

Hong Kong King Buffet features a variety of dining options. Customers can choose from a lunch special menu (where all meals are under $5,) from the chef's specialties section which features a number of spicy dishes or from one of the restaurant's special combination plates (all meals are under $7).

But the main attraction of Hong Kong King Buffet is, of course, the buffet. In addition to featuring standard fare such as orange chicken, fried rice and egg rolls, the restaurant goes beyond many other Chinese buffets by also featuring sesame balls, traditional Chinese Dim sum and a variety of Japanese sushi rolls (rainbow rolls, California rolls, Hawaiian rolls, cucumber rolls, etc.)

The buffet also features several American dishes including fried plantains, fried squid, fried tilapia, pizza, garlic bread and French fries. The buffet also includes a dessert bar, salad bar and fruit bar.

Buffet customers can also order dishes from the restaurant's hibachi cooks who will prepare the food right in front of you. Customers start with spaghetti-like pasta to which they can add shrimp, sausage, beef, chicken and vegetables.

All dishes are cooked with vegetable oil and Zheng emphasized that all of the produce is served fresh and does not come from a can.

The lunch buffet is $5.95 Monday through Saturday (children can eat at a reduced price). The dinner buffet Monday through Thursday is $8.95 and the Friday and Saturday dinner buffet, which includes crab legs, is $10.55

Zheng said the dinner buffet is slightly more expensive because it includes more seafood options as well as grilled barbecue ribs.

Carryout is also available.