Genghis Grill: The combinations are endless
by Jim White
The Business Lunch

Here's a meal deal that can't go wrong. Or, if it does, you have no one to blame but yourself. You are the chef. You pick the ingredients. You season the dish to your taste. For those of us with a finicky palate, the new Genghis Grill Mongolian Barbecue is a match made in heaven. I was intrigued when I first heard about the concept. After trying it, I'm a believer. Here's the drill: From a serving line laden with goodies you grab a bowl, select meat, fish or fowl, add oil, choose your vegetables, decide which sauce you'd like, add some spices and then hand the ingredients to a grill master who cooks it. One minute later your chef de jour creation is in front of you with a bowl of rice and a flour tortilla (interesting cultural exchange) and you are enjoying the piece de resistance - viola! You need a methematician to figure out the number of possible combinations, but I've gotta figure you could have lunch here every day between now and the millennium and never have the same dish twice. For the meat portion choose from turkey, beef, pork, chicken, lamb, calamari, shrimp and cod. Add almost any vegetable you can imagine. I had cilantro, celery, green onions, water chestnut, snow peas, broccoli, and mixed bell peppers. Spice it up with jalapeno or cayene pepper - careful! Choose salty sauces like soy, hoisin or teriyaki; sweet sauces like apricot honey mustard or plum sweet and sour; or go spicy with chili garlic (my choice) or Szechuan chili. The list goes on. You'll love the price: $6.95 for you meal in a bowl, or go back through the serving line as many times as your stomach allows for $8.95. Have it vegetarian. Have it spicy. Have it mild. Have it any way that suits your fancy. I like this place. It's casual, friendly and great for the colleague or client who can't decide what to have for lunch. Variety is the spice of life. Enjoy.
* The above article appeared in Dallas Business Journal on February 12-18, 1999. Current pricing may differ from the above listed prices.

The Dallas Morning News Guide

Genghis Grill offers culinary adventure
by Teresa Gubbins

Mongolian barbecue is ideal for those who view eating out as an adventure, an opportunity for experimentation and fun. But its serve-yourself approach won't suit diners in search of a fine-dining experience or people who can't abide standing in line. Mongolian barbecue is not common, but it's not new to the area, either. However, most predecessors have been located in suburban areas and made the concept part of a larger menu of Chinese and/or Vietnamese food. Genghis sits in the thick of things on Lower Greenville and focuses exclusively on the Mongolian barbecue concept. Raw ingredients are arranged, cafeteria-style, on a table. You help yourself, placing your choices in a bowl and handing them off to a cook who stir-fries them before your eyes. The ingredients should be fresh, and the display should be clean. There should be a good selection and plenty of variety. A standout place might serve nifty sauces or offbeat items. Genghis covered all of these categories impressively. It offered all kinds of protein - chicken, turkey, beef, lamb, fish, tofu - shaved ultrathin for quick cooking. It offered nearly every vegetable, a produce counter of items from broccoli to bell pepper to onion and so on - all cut to an appropriate size so that stir-frying produced uniformly cooked results. There were hot sauces that ran from mild to extra hot. There were soy sauce, peanut sauce, sesame oil, garlic oil. there were jalapenos, raw and canned. There were raw eggs, to be scrambled and cooked with the meat and vegetables. At the end of the line sits a massive, circular stove, manned by two cooks with long sticks. They take each bowl and spill it onto the surface - hisss - then hack at the food with the sticks until everything is cooked to a fine state of doneness. What sizzle, what a fiery display - what an entertaining combination of dinner and show biz. You choose your ingredients, so you have control. And since it's all-you-can-eat ($11.95 at dinner), you can go back and amend the mistakes you made on a prior run. "Recipe cards" listing combinations of vegetables, meat and sauces are thoughtfully provided for those unsure about what to select. The room is understated and nicely appointed, with extra-tall chairs and tables and a long bar for those not in the mood for food. Genghis is a destination place, a party place, a place for groups. It's fun for first dates, since the fanfare fills those awkward silences. How fitting that it would be co-owned by Jeff Sinelli, whose extensive background as a club owner (Main St. Asylum, the Gold Bar) gives him "expertise" in the arena of people interaction and romance.
* The above article appeared in Dallas Morning News on February 19,1999. Current pricing may differ from the above listed prices.

You go back to your table to taste your creation and presto! - you're a restaurant critic. Too much soy? Next time, maybe, you should ladle on another dollop of Mongolian pepper sauce or garlic. Perhaps a little more crunch - bean sprouts? cabbage? - is what your dinner needs to be perfect. And maybe you blew it. What were you thinking, piling pineapple, lamb, and barbecue sauce on the same dish? That's OK. Leave your bowl on the table and try again. Mongolian barbecue is all you can eat, one price for the meal.

It struck us as a strange concept, and somewhat awkward at first. We wanted to relax before dinner with a drink (all the wines are between $15 and $20 a bottle) and a nibble, but you have to go through the whole cooking ritual before you can do that - just like home. Hey, is this really dining out?

  Anyway, you can spice your dinner with an Asian flavor, adopt a Southwest seasoning philosophy, or stick with meat and potatoes - it's up to you. We were pleased with our concoctions and impressed with our own cooking talent, and Genghis Grill provides some basic recipes for people who don't know the difference between tamarind and teriyaki. Our recipe suggestion: Cook some pork with a handful of sesame seeds, snow peas, water chestnuts, red oinion, and chili pepper, a ladle of sesame oil, and two ladles of gingery black bean sauce. Then wrap it in a tortilla.

Mary Brown Malouf and Nancy Nichols

Email us at info@genghisgrill.com

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4099 McEwen, Suite 305, Dallas, TX; 75244
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