Jonah and the Whale Seafood Buffet

We always do an all you can eat seafood buffet once per trip. My daughter remembered she’d like this one from last time, so we chose it again. The set up is a little odd. You walk past the salad bar entering the restaurant. ON top of the salad bar they have a pasta bar, seafood and hot food area, and dessert bar. You can choose the entire buffet (30.99?) or you can choose pasta (14.99? which you get the pasta bar, soup, salad, and dessert) or just the salad bar (8.99? which is salad, soup, and dessert). The food was good. I loved the mashed potatoes. The crab was refilled quickly. The servers were great. He refilled our drinks quickly. Also, if you order from the pasta bar, they make it and bring it to you when ready. The desserts weren’t great, but you can’t go wrong with ice cream!

I never ever write reviews. But I just had to for this buffet in OC! The owners and the buffet itself are so caring and really want you to have a great quality meal. Every time I come in here I feel welcomed by the hostesses and even the managers. They always have one of the managers/​owners walking around to check to make sure everything is running smoothly. It is clean, friendly and they do a fabulous job. It is an older building/​place but that is what makes it so homey! Steve the owner is great! He really cares about his buffet and tries to make sure everyone has a great tasting meal! He makes everything from scratch daily except for desserts. That tells you something when EVERYTHING is made from scratch. I would recommend this place to anyone and will be going back every year at Ocean City!!! Thank you for giving me a wonderful experience.

We had a wonderful experience at Jonah. I have several food allergies (the most severe being eggs and milk), so it is a challenge to eat out, so I always being a safe food supply with me. Our waitress was cheerful and happy to ensure that I had a safe and enjoyable meal. She even heated up the non-​dairy butter I had in my safe food supply; crab legs just aren’t the same without ‘butter’. The reason I’m only giving them 4 stars is because their allergy friendly options are limited.

Very quiet place. Food is good for kids. Crab legs were a little dry. A bit pricey for a buffett.

I like this place. The seafood is average but for the price down the shore, you can’t beat it. Great if you have kids, free and reduced pricing depending on age! Salad, soup, seafood, soul food, and dessert for about $ 20 a person.

Not really great food. Very expensive!!! Won’t be eating here again. Yes, there’s a coupon and it was so close to our hotel, but it was NOT WORTH IT!!! Buffet was mediocre, seafood was not good! Place is run down!

I didn’t even bother sitting down. When you first check in, they take you through a hall where the salad is and two bowls of soup and then they lead you into their small dining hall. It was awful. They sat us in between two full tables with no room for our table to get in and out without bothering the people around us. On top of that, the food was not fresh. Like I said, I didn’t even have a seat, before I took my family out of there and went to Embers.

Well vaca is almost about over and when I asked the wife and kids where they want to eat guess where they said… yup JONHA AND THE WHALE they yelled this will be 3 times in 8 days we have been here and I’m sorry but for the money and the quality of food I’d rather be here than anywhere else keep up the great work guys and girls can’t wait to see you next year… psst save some crab legs for us when we get back… lol

What can I say I went for crab leg clusters and they had them. Plenty of them! I had cocktail shrimp claims and crabs legs. They never ran out I ate way too much. I also tried the Mac and cheese which I didn’t like I also had a chicken finger hence I only went for seafood. I give this place 4 stars on the seafood alone. I didn’t like that they charged %15 tax added to the bill but I usually tip %20 plus anyway but I can see how this could be a problem for some people. I would Regg go back 30 for all you can eat seafood is the bomb!!! Once again this review was just for the seafood!

This place is the worst. Food was dry and not a good selection. 15% gratuity was added automatically to our check. This place was horrible very disappointed.

Not worth the price. Food was dried out, and cold. ½ of the selections were empty and when I questioned when a particular item was to be filled, was told 3 times they were working on it, it was never filled while we were there. Worst meal for $ 80 I have ever spent.

My family eats here, every time we go to OC. The food is wonderful. There is a large selection of food, even for people who don’t like seafood. The clams and mussels here, are the best I’ve tasted. It is cheaper than other buffets around here, and if you go between 4:00 — 5:00 you get «the early bird» discount.

I am really not sure why so many people were displeased with this place!
My boyfriend and I went for the crab legs, they were cooked well and replaced often! Every time we went to the buffet there was steaming hot crab legs ready to be picked.
They had a variety of other fish available (salmon, cod, mahi mahi) and some of that was a little overcooked, but still good.
They have a salad bar, a taco bar (i made a fish taco which was delicious), a seafood bar, a pasta bar, and dessert. Of course some of it looked better than others– however that is true of any buffet styled restaurant.
Our server, while he didn’t speak great english, was always on top of things and cleared our plates in an extremely timely fashion.
I would definitely recommend this place!

Decided to try this out, disappointing. The only thing decent on the buffet was the carving station, pasta bar, crab legs, and soup. I tried some fish, it was terribly overcooked and dry. The beef on the carving station had great flavor but was not hot. Most of the sides were dry looking or tasteless. Would not go back, I would rather pay a little more and get better quality. $ 26.99 with a coupon was not worth the hassle.

Embers and Jonah are both walking distance to my hotel. Both had discounts. I picked Jonah because it’s on the boardwalk, and it was a good place to go to after working up an appetite from a day at the beach.
My family and I went early to make sure the food was at its freshest. There was already a line at 4pm. Tables are assigned at the door, and a host walks you to your table while giving a tour of where the food stations are. The salad bar, taco bar, and soup tureens are in the corridor. Upon entering the dining room, you see dark wood furnishings reminiscent of old fishing towns, with a mural painting of fishermen trying to catch a whale.
Inside, the food stations are laid out in a U-​shape. The pasta and raw bar stations are first. Then the hot foods, the cold shrimp cocktail, carving station for ham and roast beef, and desserts. A lot of the food looked of poor quality, which I expected. The key is finding the good stuff and just eating those.
My daughter and I came for the crab legs, and we got plenty. The buffet tray was always replenished, and we also had steamed mussels and clams, and fried shrimp and clam strips. My husband, who doesn’t eat shellfish, was satisfied with the carved meats and fish. We kept it simple with our sides, having only corn on the cob and white rice, and mac n’ cheese for my daughter. The clam chowder was decent.
Beer went well with the food, and prices were good: $ 3 for domestic.
For dessert, I had soft-​serve ice cream topped with crushed Oreos and caramel sauce.
Tip is added already, 10% for your server and 5% for the rest of the serving staff, for a total of 15%. I had no complaints, since service was friendly, and our plates were cleared in a timely manner. We are also on vacation, and this place put us in a good mood :)

This place was disgusting. Yes it was cheaper than some of the other buffets and I had a coupon. But the food and quality of the food was not good… at all. You get what you pay for!

Staff was on their game tonight. Ask and you shall receive. We were looking for seafood, & they had it. Good buffet food. Crab legs were steamed well, fresh oysters were shucked to order and very big. Everyone had a positive attitude.

Food was ok but I don’t appreciate the 15% tip being added to a bill. I worked for tips 15 years and i am not a cheap person I just think you should work for it and get what you get on merit. It’s a buffet servers didnt do much.

This is a tough one to rate. I have had some fabulous experiences here and some clear 1 star expereinces here. I am giving it 3 stars as an average of our overall experiences with Jonah.
First, let me comment on the highlights at Jonah. The raw bar and pasta bar are really wonderful! Don’t skip them if you go. The crab legs are generally good.
Everything else is a gamble. Some days you go and the cold shrimp are fine. Some days they are water-​logged and nasty. The other dishes can be succulent and fabulous on one day. Other days the same dish is dried out or over-​cooked.
The service is generally friendly. The atmosphere is busy and loud (on weekends especially).
I see it as your classic tourist town buffet.

While we were in Ocean City, we were looking for a good all-​you-​can-​eat seafood buffet that we have never tried and out of all the ones we could have chosen, we picked Jonah and the Whale. The price is $ 24.99 and includes everything, but while we were on the beach we saw an airplane advertisement with a special price for $ 19.99 and decided to go there. Bad move on our part.
Dinner started at 4:00 pm (early bird prices until 4:30 pm) and we arrived around 6 pm and the hostess told us there was a wait. We could easily see inside the dining area and saw plenty of tables that were open. After about twenty minutes, we were finally seated. As soon as we were seated, all the people that had been waiting behind us were seated in the empty tables that were vacant for the last twenty minutes.
They have a salad bar, pasta bar, taco station, soups, and plenty of seafood, meat, and sides. The quality of all the food is not too great. I had some king crab legs that were just awful. The meat I had for my taco was dry and tasteless, like it had been sitting out for a few hours… which it probably had been. The crab imperial had an intense amount of mustard on it and tasted horrible. There were a whole bunch of other things that I tried, but nothing was the least bit impressive.
Good thing for the «servers» that the tip is included because we wouldn’t have left one. Ours hardly come to the table except when you’re seated and when you’re about to leave, but even then we had to flag our waitress down so we could get the check.