[Recently heard from my man Adam Fast, who is heading out to the middle east as part of the burgeoning supply industry attached to the pretty well-set military operations going on over there for ever. Towards the end of the C-Mack site, when I was losing interest and Mike DIKK had his own site, Adam Fast was the most prolific contributor, and I was always dug his stuff, even if I did more editing to his stuff than anybody else's, mostly his textbook correct use of punctuation and my basic disgust with certain punctuation rules that I refuse to accept like any self-pretentious "writer" would feel appropriate. Here is a thing Adam Fast wrote on buffets, which I chose because I had heard at one point that Adam Fast was going to have a website all about competitive eating, which is something I've dabbled my obsessiveness in over the last couple years, and if somebody had actually done an all-encompassing competitive eating website, I would've been all over that shit.]
Strap On the Feedbag, Fattie
Buffets are the ultimate manifestation of American Gluttony. It is greasy excess in overdrive and a short cut to the Heart Attack Highway. All across this great land, fat people with fat hands push and shove as much food in their stomach as possible for the low, low price of $6.99.
My grandma loved buffets. She loved Old Country Buffet (OCB) in particular. In fact, all old people love OCB. That is why my cousins and I all called it Old Fuckers Buffet. The people in the dining room of the place looked like they were eating their last meal before they made their long walk home to the Lord. If you are going to die soon, you might as well do it with a full stomach. Grandma would drag the Grandkids out to the OCB whenever she was watching us. Depression Era mentality demands the most bang for your buck and at the OCB, you get a mother humping dynamite stick of food for a few measly dollars.
As a kid, I didn’t get much out of buffets. At most, I could put down a plate, maybe a plate and half. My fat ass cousin could eat for hours. He was a non-stop buffet warrior, even at the tender age of 12. I, on the other hand, was getting lectures from Granny about cleaning my plate. “Grandma gets very embarrassed when you leave food on your plate, Adam,” she would tell me. Well, Grandma also refers to herself in the third person so get over it. I do find it ironic that she was so concerned about me wasting food in a restaurant based on wasting food. While hunger runs rampant throughout the world, as well as in this country, we true blue Americans gather around long steam tables, overflowing with the goodness of meatloaf, catfish, mac-n-cheese, green bean casserole and over a hundred mayonnaise based salads. An American buffet is a middle finger in the face of the hungry. I would like to say I mind, but I really don’t. It is just how we are as a people. So, strap on your feedbags true Patriots and let’s talk about buffets.
Buffets have been around for as long as I remember but the Buffet concept seems to be growing at an exponential rate. While I have no facts to support this, the craze seems to have started with low rent chain steakhouses who began offering “Mile Long Salad Bars” and all you can eat Nacho Bars to go with their cheap cuts of meat and baked potato. As a kid, my family went to Bonanza, a low ball “steakhouse”, even though my Mom swore they sprayed the salad bar with a chemical that makes your stomach feel full. This prevents a 400 pound man from eating the restaurant out of house and home. Ponderosa and Golden Coral are of the same ilk. But the hungry masses craved more and that is when the shit got international.
Almost over night, every Chinese restaurant in my area went from being an actual sit down dining experience to a trough style pig out. Gone are the days of having a waitress in a cheesy Kimono style dress serve you sweet and sour chicken. Oh no…now you have to get the goods yourself and watch Bob and Susie Midwest shove as much General Tso’s down their throat before they fight for their fortune cookie. Great Buddha, please give us enlightenment!
Chinese buffets rub me wrong for a couple of reasons. One, I resent the fact the Asian people have to water their native food down so that it is palatable for idiots. When Asians come to this country and open a restaurant, regardless if they are actually Chinese or not, they have to go with a Chinese restaurant if they want to succeed. Here in the Midwest, Korean, Thai, Vietnamese, etc, restaurants are few and far between. However, “Chinese” joints pop up like pimples on a kid with out an Oxy Pad.
Secondly, after already dumbing down the food, the owners have to further degrade themselves and put a bunch of bullshit out like a salad bar, chocolate pudding, and a friggin’ sundae bar. Here is a novel idea, how about some more Chinese food on your Chinese buffet? If I wanted the nacho bar, I wouldn’t come to a place called the Great Wall.
After a while, pizza joints wanted to get in on the crazy train we call buffets. I respect pizza places for trying, but of all the buffets in this great land, they are nothing but half steppers. In most areas, between the hours of 11 AM and 2 PM, you can find numerous chain pizza places slopping out all you can eat pizza for lunch. Included in the fee is the smallest and most retarded of all salad bars. I really don’t even know why they bother. To me, pizza buffets should more appropriately be called “Get Rid of the Toppings No One Eats”. How hard is it to make a pepperoni pizza? The pizza place throws up one “normal” pizza and within three minutes the shit is gone. What is left? A bunch of pizzas with combinations so nasty, the homeless wouldn’t eat them.
The only exception to the rule of pizza buffets comes in the way of an all buffet, all the time pizza joint called Ci-Ci’s. This beautiful chain of restaurants in the South and Southeast have made the pizza buffet an art. It seems every small town in Texas has one. At Ci-Ci’s, if you don’t see a pizza under the heating lamps that you like, the mo fo’s will make you half of a pizza of whatever you want AND announce the arrival of said pizza in a loud, obnoxious voice. Actually, everything they do at Ci-Ci’s is borderline obnoxious. If a Mexican pizza gets pulled out of the oven, the entire staff yells “Uno, dos, tres, Ole! Mexican Pizza is up!” Unfortunately, I forget the chant for a BBQ pizza. They also equip most places with a large screen TV that alternates between football (when in season) and the Cartoon Network. And what does it all cost? The whole sha-bang will run you $4.99 and that includes a drink.
Another half stepper in the buffet arena is the “home-style” eatery. Home-style eating is pretty much a Southern thing but these joints could be in the extreme North or on the East Coast. I know I didn’t see any when I lived in California. Regardless, these places serve shit in really big bowls or walk around with big bowls and scoop out how ever much you want upon request. Want more corn? No problem. Biscuits? Right here. The reason I call these half steppers is that they have no organized human trough for people to get their food. They just don’t leave me with a feeling that I am strapping on a feedbag to eat.
Believe it or not, I do like buffets. It is just that sometimes midway through my second plate of spaghetti, nachos and crab salad, I look up and grow disgusted at the sight of people lined up over a steaming table of nuclear food. Everyone talks about how America is growing fatter because of fast food, but why not point a greasy finger at buffets? On the other hand, I go to a regular restaurant and feel like I am getting taken for only one plate of food at $12. Hell, I could have spent half of that and had all I could eat. Then again, I don’t feel like complete and utter shit when I leave a regular eatery. Most of the time, after I go to a buffet, I end up vomiting. Then I am pissed because I am hungry again.
So for dinner tonight, celebrate excess by grabbing the kids, strapping on a feedbag and heading on down to your local buffet for some Country Fried American Gluttony.
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