$2 Buffet Dinner Salad Bar in PP (Good for Vegetarians)

This place deserves recognition: Hagar's Catering and Restaurant on St. 288 between Monivong and St. 63. Great, classy place, aircon, catered to atmosphere. Bottom line: All-You-Can-Eat $2 Salad Bar (with items like zucchini, eggplant, pearl onions, and 6 salad dressings) served in a folded-napkin atmosphere. All you hippies thrown on your best pair of sandals and come on over! You'll feel like it's a wedding, because that is their main business: Catering. You'll love the experience and the bargain (no I'm not affiliated, but if you like a place with aircon and you are eating veggies, this is the place.)

The buffet also allows for ala carte ordering. My pals ordered a really good (they said) $4 pork chop, with excellent gravy. Tender meat they said, which is a rarity in PP. Servings are medium-sized, more like French-style portions. Be dainty, or at least classy.

Needless to say, the service is superb. Really. It's really like you're at a wedding and your plates get cleared right after your done, your water is never empty. Of course, there was no one there when I went during dinner (lunches are packed, get there early), so that might be why ... which is why I'm posting this, so they keep up the $2 dinner salad bar! I'm trying to diet with veggies in the evening, and a buffet suits me just fine!

Hagar's Catering and Restaurant
012 306 075
#23 St. 288
Phnom Penh

Look at this: breakfast, coffee lounge (great upstairs and good bathrooms with the bowl-style sinks), Hi tea $2 (2pm-5pm), as well as buffet lunch for $3.50. Good Asian foods, plenty of selection. You won't leave unhappy. It's also a WiFi Hotspot. Yeah, they got wine too.

Check it out! And spread my Aloha!

Bon appetit!
Alohatiger

A surefire way to get sick, eat at a buffet

I have heard that I should not eat vegetables in Cambodia at all unless I know that they were JUST cooked. And watch out for unpeeled fruit, watch out for anything washed in non-bottled water, etc. Seems like it's going to be tough to eat at all, what with all the "don'ts". Does anyone besides alohatiger know anything more on this topic? Like, for example, what CAN I eat??

Common sense is all it takes. I wouldn't avoid fruit and vegetables out here in Cambodia. Some of the best tropical fruit in the world can be found here.

The hygienic practices used varies from place to place but on first glance you can usually work out if you would eat there or not. The majority of places are ok. Dont worry about the wrong type of water being used in cooking because it isn't. Clean water is cheap and plentiful and khmers dont want to get food poisoning just as much as you dont. I have had food poisoning once in Asia in the last fou8r years of living in Cambodia. I got htat when I only ate at trusted western establishments. I have never been sick from eating streetside food.

Cambodia has some of the best food in the region and it would be a shame to come all this way and then miss out because a travel guide wrongly informed you to avoid the fruit.

I have to agree with #3: PP has gotten much better. I'm sure outside of PP in the provinces it may be questionable, but PP has good clean water. The only problem I have heard of is with "square" ice: only round ice uses clean water. Square ice may be questionable.

Watch that powdered "ice" also...it has a real kick in it!!

Errr, Ticotim, do you actually KNOW Hagar? Have you eaten there?

They are (yet another) NGO that specialises in training Khmers in food hygiene and preperation. I have been in their kitchens and their hygiene standard is as good ( or better) than in resturanats in the west.

I have eaten both there and PSE's buffet and both are wondeful food and very good value fo money ( plus the warm fuzzies of helping a charity.)

Hellcat