Just Because It’s Endless Doesn’t Mean You Have To Treat It That Way

That’s what I was moaning saying after lunch with Partner In Crime the other day. We decided to go a little more upscale for lunch and chose a nice Italian restaurant chain. To hide the establishment’s name I will only refer to it as Drab Colored Oval Shaped Tiny Vegetable Growing Area. Perhaps you know of the chain I am speaking of. If not, it was recently brought to my attention that said eatery is also referred to as ‘The OG’ (thanks AA's sister!!). I’m sure you get it now…

We had planned on the cheap and relatively light soup and salad. Until I asked the $2.4 billion calorie question: ‘Are you still doing that endless pasta bowl thing?’ The waiter’s answer: ‘yes.’ So much for the soup and salad. I can’t recall what the first bowl I ordered was; in fact I can’t remember what the second bowl I ordered was. Nor can I tell you whether it was tasty or not. I believe there was some type of sauce and most likely cheese involved, but other than that, I’m pretty clueless (as far as the food, no smarty ass remarks!)

I guess if I had ended at just two bowls of pasta, despite its endless moniker, I would have been ok. But I had to down two more additional bowls for a total of 4 bowls (sounds like a Total cereal commercial)of rather unmemorable pasta and sauce combinations. Then I had to add 4 breadsticks and 2.5 bowls of salad. I may have also snacked on a napkin and had to ask for more lemons in my iced tea, despite the fact that out waiter swore my tea had lemons when it was delivered to our table. I am also pretty sure that there were those OG wrapped mints that come with the bill to make it more palatable. I have no clue what came over me. Perhaps it was the knowledge that the sooner I got to the bottom of each bowl that there would be another waiting for me.

What is it about all you can eat situations that makes us forget about our calorie intake in the same way that a pubescent boy forgets about pretty much everything when surrounded by the local high school’s cheerleading squad? Ok, I know that rarely happens, but I wanted to provide you with an easily understandable scenario. I mean I have seen some amazing things in buffet lines. I have actually witnessed people pile up their food in configurations that should defy the laws of gravity. How in the world do greasy sauce covered ribs not slide off a jiggly Jell-O based salad? These things simply should not stay on the same plate without crashing down! And then there’s the mind baffling food combinations that find end up on the buffeters plates. I’m speaking of pie and macaroni salad on the same plate or Italian food sitting right next to Mexican food or cole slaw nested next to bread pudding. I fear sometimes that people in the buffet line forget that not only is there an unlimited amount of food, but that there are an equally unlimited number of plates upon which to place it.

Has Mike Rowe of Dirty Jobs worked cleanup at a buffet restaurant yet? If not, he should. No wait, forget it. I should. Then I can submit it to the Discovery Channel in my not so secret bid to be named as the new host of Dirty Jobs when Mr. Rowe decides that it’s easier to just do the narration for The Deadliest Catch, but you don’t care about any of that. Although I have diligently been practicing my use of the word ‘Poo’ and I am far worse at math than he is, and that’s saying something!

It might sound like I am ranting here, but I speak with some degree of knowledge, kind of, almost, ok, just a little bit. I used to be a buffet whore or ‘buffore’ as it is commonly referred. A buffet was like the satellite TV alternative for restaurants. Where a normal restaurant would be an old black and white TV that had no remote control, the buffet is a Hi-Def satellite TV feed with 500 channels, including at least 3 devoted to NASCAR. Not only would my mouth water when I entered a buffet, my eyes would water too. And it wasn’t just the smell of the dirty diaper from the kid in the booth next to me that was causing it. Yeah, I’d cry just a little. In the Eden that was the buffet table, the sheer quantity of food often overshadowed the sheer lack of its quality.

You know what, I’m getting awfully hungry. What the heck was I discussing again? Crème Brule? Crab legs? Does anyone else remember? Hmmmm, I wonder what time Billy Bawb’s Feeding Trough O-Rama around the corner opens…


****In the same spirit of Q & A Tuesdays, I'm toying with starting You Decide Thursdays. I would ask everyone to submit ideas for a post each week and then write about one of those topics each Thursday. What do ya think???****