Kabayan Authentic Filipino Cuisine

Comfort food . Familiar taste if you enjoy Filipino Food . I wish the waiter and waitress could be more attentive. They take order and serve the food . No follow up and show little signs of interest about serving you .I constantly had to flag someone over to get any assistance. We were literally one out of two parties in the restaurant at the time. At least the food was good.

The food was very good. Everyone enjoy everything we ate, including the dessert. The place was busy every table was filled on a Wednesday. Service could have been better. But the food was good

Saw my Favorite Guy Nicolas Nuvan post on IG! Called my Filipino Gal and the rest is History! Kabayan must be another way of saying Damn! It Good!! Cause Damn! It’s so good! 10/10. Foodgasmically amazing!

Filipino vibes. First time eating at their restaurant as we usually order thru online. I like their Pinakbet and Sisig. Good for the price. We went weekdays so it is not that crowded.

Good service, nice atmosphere but the food was too greasy! Definitely too much oil in the sissig and noodles! I tried other Filipino restaurants before but Kabayan is definitely too generous with the oil lol other than that, dessert was good!

Love Kabayan cooking so has become our go-to place for filipino food. Kare-kare (I always look for the tripe pieces), fried milkfish, lechon kawali, very garlicky fried rice are our usuals. Ginataang langka (jackfruit) is a coconut stew with chunks of jackfruit with pork pieces. Their ginataan laing is delicious too. Dinuguan has pork pieces and pig's ear (not into the ear so I pick out the pork meat), slightly salty for me but there's rice to have it with. Their pork bbq is not skewered, has the flavor but is a thicker slice of pork. Fresh lumpia has cooked-right veggies, maybe a bit heavy with the brown sauce but goes well with the raw garlic. The halo-halo may look plain but it really has a lot of ingredients under all the ice; and big enough to share. Prices are also good. Servings are too and we usually get to take home. Have had their special lechon belly for a special occasion and they cooked it well - crispy skin and juicy, lemongrass flavored meat. Check with them for pricing. Service is always great. We appreciate the friendly and attentive staff. Restrooms available.

plenty of food!! everything was delicious, and the dessert was a perfect end to the feast. definitely would come back again with a group of friends to enjoy a delicious, authentic filipino meal.

You couldn’t just have set it up for us? Also, no check in during our dinner while we were the only diners. Our meal took 1.5-2hrs due to this. I frequent this place. But there needs to be employee retraining. This is not hospitality.

NOTE: You have to call at least 2 days in advance and make a reservation for the Kamayan Fiesta! We did not know this as we didn't see an option to make a reservation on Google Maps and had to just order the individual dishes ): What they don't tell you is that the big dishes come with a bowl of rice. We order garlic rice on the side thinking it didn't, and was surprised to see a huge bowl of regular white rice come out. So make sure to check with the waitress! Also, the big Halo Halo dessert is not in the menu?? We saw the table next to us order one and we thought it was really cute and yummy so we also asked for one. We checked the menu for Halo Halo (there is Halo Halo and Halo Halo Special. We thought this was the special). But when we got the check it was the most expensive item (over $30). It really is huge and our party of 5 couldn't finish, but had we had known that it would be this expensive, we would have ordered the smaller one. I don't get why they didn't include this in the menu? The Sizzling Sisig felt really fatty and greasy compared to other Filipino restaurants I went to for this dish. The chicken was our favorite, and other dishes were yummy but nothing that was out of the ordinary. I would come want to back to try the feast though!

Still love Kabayan cooking so has become our go-to place for filipino food. Kare-kare (I always look for the tripe pieces), fried milkfish, lechon kawali, very garlicky fried rice are our usuals. Ginataang langka (jackfruit) is a coconut stew with chunks of jackfruit with pork pieces. Their ginataan laing is delicious too. Dinuguan has pork and pig's ear (not into this meat so I pick out the pork), slightly salty for me but there's rice to have it with. Their pork bbq is not skewered, has the flavor but is a thicker slice of pork. Fresh lumpia has cooked-right veggies, maybe a bit heavy with the brown sauce but goes well with the raw garlic. The halo-halo may look plain but it really has a lot of ingredients under all the ice; and big enough to share. Prices are also good. Servings are too and we usually get to take home. Have had their special lechon belly for a special occasion and they cooked it well - crispy skin and juicy, lemongrass flavored meat. Check with them for pricing. Service is always great. We appreciate the friendly and attentive staff. Restrooms available.

CHECK YOUR RECEIPT BEFORE LEAVING THE STORE!!! I was charged twice for one of my items. I went in and bought a lot but the final bill was a little more than I expected. It was the end of the day and I was in a rush to get home. It wasn't until I was on the train that I got the nagging feeling that I had been charged twice and sure enough, I was charged an additional $4.95 of the same item. Lesson learned. I think the food is solid, but the cashier was busy having a good time and not paying attention to ringing me up.

Ordered my dinner for takeout via Door Dash. The staff was very friendly and they kept my food warm while I was stuck in typical BQE traffic. The food was very good. Their kara-kare was very flavorful and the sauce was on point. The chicken inasal was also very tasty. Their pancit bihon was also delicious. They are definitely worth coming back to. Parking though, is always an issue though, especially in the evenings

Service: 4.7/5 Food: 3.9/5 Ambiance: very casual, great for groups of all sizes 10/10 customer service- went above + beyond helping another customer deal w/ the pouring rain outside. it's small space surprisingly accommodate a lot of heads. very efficient. you eat w/ your hands (they give gloves) + just stuff your face What I Ordered: - Kamayan: surprisingly a lot of food, will GUARANTEE leftovers. favorites: lumpiang shanghai, inihaw baboy (pork), chicken bbq, sautéed mussels

It had been 6 years since my first and last visit and I'd always wanted to bring another friend group to "WOW" them with a Kamayan experience. I knew this place wouldn't disappoint. We were a group of about 9-10 people and most of us came with our already huge appetites after the gym. They set up about 3 stations for us all, which still ended up being way too much food than we could handle - they just kept coming with more and more food. But everything from the copious amounts of roasted pork, mussels, shrimp, vegetables, and lumpia were excellent. The beef bone broth was heavenly and I just had to take a container home because it killed me to let that go to waste. When the humongous halo halo came, it was the icing on the top and we seriously didn't want any food at this point (we still had it, though). One huge difference that I noticed from my previous visit was that we were given gloves to eat with this time. Dunno if it's because of post-covid precautions but it's giving me the icks now that I look back at having eaten with my bare hands, Though I appreciated that they gave us a heads-up beforehand, I was a little annoyed that they decided to tell us that there would be an additional $5 charge per head because they would have a live band playing during our reservation. We ended up having loads of fun with the band itself that night so it ended up being minor. Make sure you have the exact number of guests coming because they will prepare the portions based on that and still charge per head from that number. I recommend knocking down 1-2 people when making a reservation if you know your group can't eat that much because they will make roughly 2x more food per person - they can still adjust the price to the final headcount.

It was my first time experiencing a kamayan feast and it exceeded my expectations! Firstly, pretty much everyone at the restaurant did kamayan. We made reservations for a group of 6 and once we got there, our table was already set with banana leaves and the spread came out shortly after. There was a variety of pork, chicken, beef, seafood, bone marrow soup, and fruit to close out the meal. My FAVORITE was the soup, which had a delicious fatty broth flavor, and the pork belly, which had a yummy sweet taste - DELICIOUS. Everything else was still very good! You do eat with your hands, but they provide gloves and additional utensils, if needed. I was honestly a bit overwhelmed with the entire spread, in the best way possible, and my group ended up taking leftovers back because of how full we all were. The staff were extremely friendly and the ambiance was very family-oriented. I'd absolutely come back for this home-y experience and filling meal - 11/10!!

Specifically came here to try kamayan for the first time. We got to watch the staff set up the banana leaves and food, but I wish I didn't. I'm very particular when it comes to food/kitchen cleanliness, so I got the ick when I saw them wipe down the tables and leaves with rags, which are probably the same rags that they use to clean the tables. I did appreciate the fact that they wore gloves when handling the food. All of the food went straight onto the leaves except for the soup, which sat in the middle of the table. Everyone had their own pile of mango salad and a small bowl and spoon for drinking the soup, but the rest of the food was meant to be shared and eaten with your hands so make sure you clean them babies well. An assortment of meats, veggies, and seafood were provided. My faves were obviously the fried food: lumpia and calamari. I don't think there was anything that I didn't like, and I loved how I got to try so many different Filipino dishes in such a short amount of time. We ate until our bellies were full, but a lot remained untouched. Thankfully, we were allowed to take the rest of the food home. I did get sick after but I'm not sure if it was from this place or a snack shop that I visited in Flushing after kamayan.

I had my mom and her sister in town that was craving home-cooked food from the islands. I knew Kabayan would be perfect. It's a cute little restaurant with a few tables and cute decor but amazing food options and the taste was just like home! The service was cool. they were quick took our order was patient with us and made sure we were getting everything we needed, this place is around the corner from my house on Queens Boulevard and I can't wait to go back here again especially when I'm craving Filipino home-cooked food! whenever I'm home sick I will be here Mom approved

I loved this place; we went yesterday for the kamayan experience and it was amazing. It had everything we wanted in a meal. The service was amazing and overall a great time. We were never rushed and it was a very clean experience. The person creating the kamayan had gloves on when putting the food on the table. They would check in on us regularly and the food was very good. The shrimps were well seasoned and cooked properly. The pork was also flavorful and cooked well. The chicken was good as well. We each had a piece of fried fish and that was also good. Overall the different flavors and seasonings had their own section on the table. This was great because it allowed us to taste each item differently and not have things combined. They also have a delicious soup which they put in the middle of the table. That soup was really good. I loved this and recommend to everyone.

When my friend invited me to join him for a birthday dinner, I was super excited to experience kamayan aka boodle fight. The first time I've had this was in Manhattan, and sadly that place closed. It's only right that you do this in a large group celebration. We started off with the beef stew that came with delicious bone marrow. The flavor penetrates your soul and I can drink this all day. You can feel the vitality running through your veins. Next up was all the lumpia, fish, meat and rice with some veggies in the side. I unfortunately cannot name it all but I can tell you that it was rich and tasty. We were the last to leave on a Tuesday night. Thank you to the staff who put this all together!

Great service and quick setup, delicious food, great music. Food was great and the highlights for me was the soup and the pork! Thanks for the great experience! I will come back in the future

0 stars. Writing this from the table so that I don't forget to mention any of this disappointing experience. I ordered the beef tapa, lumpia, and garlic rice. From the jump, the waiter seemed annoyed with me. The lumpia was delicious. So was the garlic rice. Beef tapa was completely different from last time. I told the manager and she SNAPPED at me. Yelled "WHAT". Very embarrassing. Also, they put all of my plates at the edge of the table (as seen in the attached photo) instead of in front of me like they had for other guests. It was extremely passive. While cleaning the table next to me, I got cleaner sprayed in my face. I don't believe in coincidences. Went from recommending this restaurant to avoiding it..

Never again! I used to love kabayan ever since they open specially the pork sinigang. Recently , I ordered one to go and when I was pouring it in the bowl I saw a small cockroach floating in the broth. I was very surprised and furious on how unclean the food is. I have to tossed it out. A waste of money.

I decided to have a themed bday party which was Hawaiian luau and hence having. Roasted pig is a necessity . After reviewing a few places on Yelp , I opted to order from this restaurant and I'm glad I did . My coworkers were raving about how delicious the lechon was . The person who took my order was friendly , helpful and cheerful ( so nice dealing with him ) Lechon is a dish served by other cultures ( including other Latin countries because of the spanish influence ) and Filipinos have the better , tastier version (in my opinion) . Having a 30lb is good for larger parties . It comes with a a delicious sauce . I also ordered the chicken teriyaki which was a huge crowd fave as well . Some friends of friends decided to try the restaurant and was told that the other dishes are equally as good , one that was mentioned was the bulalo . Would like to also check out the resto one of these days to eat there and try the other dishes .

They have good authentic Filipino food. The service is excellent. Our server was very entertaining with funny comments. The ambience is clean and white decor as if you are in a Greek taverna. That is what it reminds me of anyway. The giant bowl of beef soup with cabbage is excellent. Flavorful broth and the meat has a lot of tendons attached to the gigantic bone. I have never seen such a gigantic bone! And the ligaments are not fat. Bakthiugh they look like one. The fried bangus is a butterflied fish fried to perfection. I liked it with their vinegar. The vegetable I like is not over cooked. It has okra in it. I cannot believe that we picked all fried foods. But they were not greasy. But there are many other dishes besides fried - we just ended up ordering the fried ones!

This place deserves a 5 star! The service was really amazing! They were very sweet about our friends birthday. They provided plates, put music on, and even sang for her. The staff was really nice and very kind to answer our questions. Food was super amazing too. As a food lover, I enjoyed everything. If you come with picky people, there will be something for everyone. Thank

The inside was clean and in order. Generous serving and definitely authentic Filipino food. Typical friendly staff when you go to a Filipino resto. Unlike the one in Manhattan. Highly recommended if you want an authentic taste of Fil dish.

The food is decent. Nothing to write home about. They had a singer there playing acoustic music during dinner. The hostess came to clear our plates after dinner and said it was $5 a person at our table as overhead for their entertainment. How dare they? You want entertainment at your establishment and you charge your customers for that after they eat? At least you should tell people as they enter that they will be charged per person for the singer they booked, so they can decide if they want to stay or leave.

Alas was not prepared for the kamayan feast so we ordered a la carte -- but will come back for the feast one day! We got: - pancit bihon 7/10: flavors were pretty mild compared to what im used to - lechon kawali 8/10: excellently fried and mostly juicy, paired well with the garlic rice - dinuguan 10/10: definitely the star of the meal. The meat was very tender and the flavors were on point - i wished i could keep eating this forever

This restaurant was exceptionally delightful. They offered live music, and the singer was incredibly talented. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, and the affordability of the food made me eager to return. The only downside was its location inside Queens, which was quite far from me since I live in Manhattan. While I'm not Filipino, my friends who are said that the food was outstanding, and they considered it one of the best Filipino restaurants in the area. I'd rate this place at a solid 5 stars.

Came here the other night for a Kamayan feast and it really was quite the experience. From the moment we walked in there was a great singer doing live music and hosting karaoke which was we participated in many times throughout the night. When our feast was set up on the table I was blown away by how large and amazing it looked. The food all tasted pretty great and stayed remarkably warm while being out. This was my first time having a Kamayan feast but most definitely will not be my last. There was enough food for everyone to be stuffed and still take home almost a full take-out box each. For this amount and quality of food, this was such a great value. I'll probably recommend this place to all my friends!

My first time with the kaMayan feast laid out on the table on the leave and oh man it was heavenly. The food were delicious. All types of meats, mussels, shrimps and vegetable. The mango salad was refreshing. The bone marrow soup in the middle was flavorful. Service was great. Waiters and waitresses were all friendly and professional. It was my brothers bday and they provided flan and the entire team sang the happy birthday song. It was super lively. Even all the other customers join along singing. We all enjoyed our time and will def return for some more.

Mix feeling other person in my group enjoyed the food. That person does not eat a lot of Filipino food. I am going to start with the basic Rice. The rice was like super sticky porridge consistency. We ordered Garlic fried rice and it was also super sticky and could not even taste the garlic just Soy Sauce. The Palabok was overpriced for such a small portion. I think the food is just overpriced in general. Would I go back that would be a hard pass.

A Filipino friend would invite us over every year for New Year's Eve at their house and she would cook up a storm of everything served in a Pinoy party buffet. Kabayan reminds me of those times when we would have a ton of home-cooked food in a casual almost living room setting. They've even done a renovation in between times we've been here. We always start with my favorite, Lumpiang Shanghai, mini spring rolls and we sometimes get 2 large orders because I can almost finish one by myself. Dip it in the sweet sauce and enjoy. Those aren't to be confused with Fresh Lumpia, which is freshly made veggie crepes covered in peanut sauce, also pretty good. We always over order on entrees. Sizzling Sisig has a lot of miscellaneous pig parts you wouldn't normally see and it's served on a red hot cast iron plate. The Grilled Salmon Neck was a little too well done, but still very flavorful. A side of Garlic Rice goes well with most dishes, especially Kare Kare (Oxtail, Tripe & Peanut Stew). If you have a party of more than two, get the Crispy Pata (Deep Fried Pig Knuckle) and rip that sucker apart to dig out all that tender meat. My wife's favorite is Pancit Canton (glass noodles), me not so much. And you cannot leave with out dessert, so leave some room. Halo Halo is the way to go, but sometimes we'll just be different to try out Turon another Ube base dessert or maybe even have another order of lumpia! I hope that we can get back to normalcy again, because I would love to do a kamayan here with a whole load of people and just eat like crazy off the table covered in banana leaves and all my favorite Filipino FOODS!

Okay, so it was about 8 years ago that I tried this place when it first opened and I was not happy. But fast forward to this year when I decided to give them another try and ordered take out for a group of 4 people. I was blown away and happy to see the big difference in quality and taste. We ordered: - Lumpiang shanghai - Lechon kawali - Garlic fried rice - Pork and chicken BBQ - Pork sisig - Pinakbet - Pancit canton Not one of those dishes listed above were bad. They were so good that Kabayan is now on the top of the list of places to come back to for amazing Filipino food. So glad I came back to a more polished spot serving delicious food with friendly staff!

Second order through Doordash delivery: They pack very good portions and the food was consistently good on this second round (this time was pork sisig, chicken bbq, small garlic rice)

Haven't actually eaten at the restaurant itself, but my family and I order delivery at least twice a week. This is as good as it gets for traditional Filipino food. Their arroz caldo is very flavorful, and it was the only thing that we wanted to eat when we had covid. Lol When we first started ordering, they would have issues like spillage or missing items. But recently they've been consistent and I hope it stays that way!

I had kabayan and what they do is lay out banana leaves. They press it down and make sure they all connect. The food comes in bowls but they wore gloves as they spread it out evenly on the banana leaves. But she used the same gloves to answer her phone so idk about that. I kind of just turned a blind eye to it. The soup goes in the middle and mango salad by your individual soup bowl. They had calamari and lumpia that day for kabayan. They also had other meats and one piece of fish for everyone. It was my first time so my tip for the non-filipinos is to eat with your hands after you use their restroom to wash. They give wipe towels but I just preferred washing my hands with water and soap. We were all so full- we all took the leftovers home. Halo halo seemed to be a popular dessert ordered by order customers there.

The best Kare Kare I've had here in New York.... The Nilagang Bulalo was very tender. The sisig I did not like. Too saucy. I never had a Filipino cuisine well prepared like how they did these food justice. Their staff were nice and polite. All The food I ordered were very tasty and priced reasonably. Masarap! That's all I can say! Haha

The food is good, service is ok while you are there but no one picks up the phones and the online reservations don't get honored, called the 2 numbers over 10 times each for an important event, when we finally decided to just go there they stated that the kitchen was closed by 9pm, note.. it was not on the google google page and it looks like the waitress didn't know what we were talking about. So, the food is usually good, service is ok but the way they managed phone calls and reservations needs to be worked on. The ambiance is nice though.

Basic dining space, good food and amazing service!!Great location, easy street parking. We went directly for the mains, Daing na Bangus is our favorite. Paksiw na Lechon, Beef Kaldereta and Tortang Talong are excellent with garlic fried rice. Breakfast should be served all day!!! At least we were able to order a side of eggs. Chicken Inasal and Arroz Caldo rounded up the menu. Avocado shake was good and can't go wrong with San Miguel beers. The staff here really shine, great place to bring your family!!

I think it's always a huge plus when there is a place that literally specializes in one of my favorite kinds of communal meals: kamayan style. Kabayan has been around for the last few years, directly competing with nearby Filipino spots and being actually open during this pandemic. It's somewhat obvious, but a good kamayan spread is best enjoyed with others. At roughly $35 (#1), the spread over the banana leaves include: lumpiang shanghai, chicharon bulaklak, lechon kawali, a soup, baby daing na, banghus, bbq chicken, bicol express pork, pinakbet, tocino, beef tapa, shrimp, mussels, and a mango salad. As a substitute, kare kare is also available as an extra charge. For me, it's worth it. While the place isn't big, they're good about taking in groups of people ahead of time (call for reservations) and setting everything up upon arrival. It is a hands on experience (i.e. best enjoyed with hands); they provide wipes for the post-feast. I think they may have gloves, but I've never asked personally. They are open during this time and are offering delivery and takeout. The truth is I wasn't their biggest fan during the initial run, but I feel that they've made some substantial improvements with food quality and customer service. My rating would be a 3.5 but I'm rounding to a 4 with the good faith that they'll continue to get better and stay consistent with their food. (#2) __________ (#1) I still miss it when the prices were roughly $25. Inflation is such a jerk sometimes. (#2) Their other location could probably benefit from this as well: https://www.yelp.com/biz/kabayan-grill-woodside

Food is good, location is good, service is good but billing? I was almost scam, every food we order was billed twice, it's good my mother and sister thought we paid too much, lo and behold, when I check the bill they double billed most of the food we order, in excess of about $400, I have to return to the resto all the way from Long Island to have it corrected. WARNING: make sure to double check ur bill before paying in this resto. I want to believe that it was an honest mistake but having double bill almost all the order is very doubtful. See reciept below for the proof.

Great delicious food. I like everything in the menu. Filipino ambiance, nice place. Friendly staff.

So much food. Good service and the food taste authentic filipino food. i saw some non filipino tried the boddle fight.

This is definitely the best HANDS-ON way to experience Filipino culture! Haha. A Kamayan feast costs about $35 a person which is hellla pricey for what you get. It's a fancy spread of a bunch of colorful Filipino entrees and appetizers on banana leaves. At first, I thought this was amazing, but I realize the food isn't anything special, and there isn't actually that much food. There are no refills. Prepare to eat A LOT of meat (huge amount of pork and only some seafood). My favorite would have to be the Lumpia, although you don't get a lot of pieces. The Bulalo soup also was good, if it wasn't for these circular black things in it that made the soup spicy and hard to drink. Overall, with tax and tip, the meal comes to be 40+ for just eating a whole lot of meat. Let's just also say the meal wasn't the nicest to my stomach either! Kamayan is a fun experience to try at least once, but never again.

Hospitality and food are authentically Filipino. Even the other diners were friendly. The food tastes just like home but the best version of homemade. I went there for my birthday and they surprised me with a birthday dessert.

I ordered through delivery.com for to go order. And got the confirmation that the restaurant received my order. They told me that they don't do delivery.com I told them that they confirmed it so ended up calling delivery.com and told them what happened and they did a refund. I ordered the food in the restaurant after all that. We got the grilled tuna belly, sinampalukang manok and chicken bbq. The tuna belly was dry and hard. The sinampalukang manok was on point though, the best soup I've had. The chicken bbq was good as well. Gave them 2 stars because had to wait 30 minutes for our food, tried ordering it early so don't have to wait for a long time. I was excited to eat the tuna belly but after the first bite I was disappointed. They were better before.

The staff is friendly, patient & helpful. The food was out of this world! Best to eat at the restaurant. I had their takeout in the past and is was way better at the restaurant.

Kabayan is one of the more affordable kabayan restaurants in NYC. We were able to reserve the whole restaurant for our party of 16 for kabayan. During these COVID times, we were divided into three parties with big pieces of plastic coverings separating us. The restaurant staff were so friendly and helpful throughout our reservation. They were very attentive and the service was one of the best. The beef soup is definitely my favorite. There was so much flavor, filled with tender beef, veggies and bone marrow. The food was a little salty for my liking, but overall still very tasty. FYI: double check the address when you plug it into the GPS. We went to the wrong "Kabayan resaurant" (oops)

Making a reservation ahead of time, our party of 13 arrived for a night of delicious and a super filling Filipino Kamayan! For those of you who've never had kamayan before, this is family-style and communal, aka be prepared to eat with your hands! I've had kamayan in the past, but nothing beats sharing with a large group of friends and family at Kabayan. From chowing through the tilapia, lumpia, various pork, bone marrow soup, mussels, and shrimp, my friends and I had a blast sharing conversation while enjoying the food. Oh, and must try their Halo Halo! Ah. May. Zing. Plus, the staff here are super friendly and helpful. By the time we arrived, they were already setting the table with our food, so we didn't even have to wait. 10/10 would highly recommend! It's about $33 per person, not including tip and tax. Notes: -Make sure everyone wash their hands before they dig in. -Kamayan here require at least a party of 4, and they make enough food and charge for the amount of people you reserve for. So make sure you get the right headcount or call them with any updates!

Kabayan is delicious !!! Came on a snowy morning and had the arroz caldo which hit the spot ! Was a larger potion than expected so def recommend sharing ! Of course I got the lumpiang Shanghai and it was great ! I got the chicken adobo to go and ate it for lunch later on and it tasted absolutely amazing ! The broth was extremely hearty and filling. Looking forward to coming back to try the rest of their dishes .

Kamayan experience here has a huge spread of goodness! Reservation is required if you want to do kamayan since they need time to make the food and set it up. Gather your hungriest friends and attack! Of the spreads, my favorite ones are the spring rolls, okra, fried pork belly, and the beef broth!

Piece of fried plastic in my dasilog order. They apologized of course but surely that's a health violation and nope I'm not coming back. I don't trust their food anymore

Kamayan! Kamayan! Kamayan! C'mon chant it out loud with me! From what I read Kamayan simply means eating "with hands", an old school, customary way of eating in the Philippines. More recently it seems to have come to mean a way of celebrating, by bringing people together with a festive feast, or when it involves my fellow Yelp (and Yelp adjacent) food loving friends, a typical Wednesday night! To do Kamayan at Kabayan you need to reserve with a group of 4 or more. Although it may look like it is buffet style it is NOT. The food is made to order and portioned to the number of attendees. So if your group has people that flake last minute be warned they will still charge you the full freight for each person you told them would attend. Rightfully so! No worries either because they give you take out containers to take home leftovers ("boan") - meals for days! lol If you are not accustomed to the Filipino style of eating with your hands a little google search can give you some pointers - wash hands, eat with one hand, use the sticky rice to scoop food, use thumb to scoot the food in your mouth without slobbering over your fingers, etc. Don't try to eat the soup by using cupped hands like you are sipping water from a stream! (They give bowls for it). For the money you get a ton of delicious food (~$33+T&T a person). Head on shrimp, plump mussels, dried fish with mango, various mounds of meats and vegetables, lumpia, huge beef bone broth soup (bones included with all that delicious marrow!) and traditional dipping sauces. See more educated reviews for the names and descriptions if you are curious or just eat and enjoy like I did! I found everything delicious. There was nothing I didn't like. The food was not heavily salted, or left me feeling overwhelmingly full. Although unfamiliar, I personally loved the style of eating with hands because I felt it allowed everyone to relax and connect with the flavors and the friends around - isn't that the beauty and the goal of dining with friends?

Several Filipino restaurants are offering Kamayan dinners, which are full-blown, family-style dinners served over bamboo leaves with no plates or eating utensils. You eat with your hands, and that's it! Kabayan joins the mix with their own Kamayan dinner, attracting large groups of young adults intrigued by the trend. I went to Kabayan for a Kamayan dinner after already having a few of these at Jeepney in East Village. For the most part, my view of my experience at Kabayan relies heavily on my benchmarked experience at Jeepney, full disclosure! Let's start with the atmoshphere of the restaurant. The real estate was decently spacious for at least two large Kamayan parties, with several tables left for other customers. The vibe of Kabayan leans more toward a typical Filipino restaurant in Queens, which is what it exactly is. I prefer this space over Jeepney, which is very cramped and overly trendy with its decor and whatnot. Now for the food. I enjoyed essentially everything I ate on the table, which included bicol express, lechon, ukoy, fried chicken, mango salad, and white rice just to name a few. The ukoy had sweet potatoes in it, which I found kinda funny. I felt like I was just eating sweet potato fries. The food unfortunately ran a bit cool since we were a large party and it took us a while to get ourselves situated for the dinner. Not sure how they could really prevent that, but that affected my overall take on the food. Another thing that threw me off was that they did nothing about cutting and serving the lechon, which was only in the middle of the table of over 14 people. We had to figure out how to carve and pass the lechon around. In comparison to Jeepney, the overall vibe of my time at Kabayan was more favorable as it reminded me of a more traditional Filipino restaurant experience. I lean more toward the food at Jeepney, however, which I found to be more fresh-off-the-grill tasty.

I'd been wanting to try the Kamayan Feast (family style) for awhile since seeing a few friends post about it so finally my fiance and our 2 friends were free on a Saturday for it. Make sure you call to make reservations if you want to do the Kamayan Feast (minimum 4 guests - if only 1-3 guests show up, you still pay for 4). I actually was lucky enough to get a reservation for 5PM on a Saturday when I called around 4PM. Not sure if you have to tell them that it's for Kamayan but I did because I read a review saying to let them know so that they can have the food ready when you show up. My fiance and I showed up around 5:15PM (found parking right up front - metered) and they had already started setting up the food and finished setting up within 5-10 minutes. They were also setting up another Kamayan Feast for what looked like 15 people at the table next to us. When my fiance and I arrived, it was just us and people trickling in for the 15 people party but by the time our 2 friends showed up 30 minutes later, the place was PACKED. There are bathrooms in the back so you can wash your hands before eating since there are no utensils for Kamayan Feast (use the rice to scoop the food). I did use my soup spoon for the rice though (shhh!) and soup of course. I'm sure if you wanted utensils to eat with, they would give it to you but the traditional way of eating it is with your hands. Kamayan Feast cost about $35 per person not including tax. You get a LOT of food (rice, lots of meats and a huge bone broth soup) and can pack whatever you want for leftovers. I packed a box for myself and my friend packed leftovers for her dogs/chickens at home. The only thing is I wish you could pick what food you wanted because I personally don't like food with a lot of fat on it so I didn't touch those and I wanted more lumpia (so addicting!!!). The beef was a little dry, head on shrimp and mussels were average but everything else was delicious and flavorful. They also give you 4 dipping sauces on the side. My friend got a Halo Halo for dessert (not included with Kamayan) and I tried some of it since I was too full to get a whole Halo Halo to myself. We both agreed it was delicious. Staff here was very nice and attentive. I would definitely come back and recommend the Kamayan Feast! I posted photos on social media and already had a bunch of friends ask where and what it was.

I had been craving sisig for sooooo long and Kabayan's hit the spot! A sizzling, fatty, creamy perfection that somehow becomes even better combo'd with their peppery garlic rice. Also don't sleep on the sinigang, they have so many kinds to choose from. I tried the one with milk fish and it was loaded with vegetables, kind of insane for only $13. You can do your snacks and bakery run here too! Such a gem of a restaurant, can't wait to come again.