Survival of the Fattest I

Part one in a series discussing the many dangers inherent in the all-you-can-eat buffet, and advice on how to avoid them. Read closely; the information here may save your life one day….

There is a certain special feeling involved with the all-you-can eat buffet, an exalted, gluttonous celebration of Jacobean proportions; slabs of shimmering meat, acres of glistening sushi, the multihued decadence of the dessert corner. The pure excess of wall to wall food is enough to make a fat man weep. Filling the cracks between the stagnant one style ‘speciality’ restaurants like ‘Thai’ restaurants or ‘pizza’ parlours, it exists as a fairy tale world where elven feasts are realized and the banquets of Neverland are brought to life in full flavoured glory.

Of course, there are rules. With such an abundance of foods in the one place there must be rules. You can’t go bounding into a professional buffet room all guns a-blazing, stacking your plate with anything and everything that comes to hand. Many a novice patron has run wild with voracious glee only to succumb to the many pitfalls inherent within. Superfluous fillers and malevolent breadsticks lurk at every turn, as do fancy foreign pastries that, though cute and pleasing to the eye, serve only to conceal a centre of pure evil.

Though I now stand before you as a hardened buffet vet, I must lay claim to my shameful past; I too was once a pasty faced all-you-can-eat greenhorn. As a skinny and innocent 14 year old, barely ready to meet the world, I was thrown into the deep end during an exchange trip to the southern US state of Louisiana. I will save you the brutal details, but suffice it to say, they were not pretty. The disdainful pity received from my American counterparts is something I recall in my nightmares to this day.

I learned the hard way. Walking into an all-you-can-eat buffet is not like walking into a normal restaurant. It is walking into a war, a vicious bloody war that pits you, your digestive system and, by god, your dignity, against an avalanche of foods. As commanding officer of your performance you must lead with a level head, a steady nerve and a constitution of iron. As any good general worth his salt will tell you, if a war is to be won, you need to have a damn good battle plan drawn up in order to win it.

Next time: War games.