Buffet Love

I love a buffet. I always have. Piles of food of all kinds laid before you. Plates that could never possibly be big enough to hold it all. Finding a bunch of items you really love and never make. It feels like the world’s your oyster.

As a child the buffet held a particular appeal. For one thing, there’s no waiting at a buffet restaurant. You don’t need to be still for 15 or 20 minutes to peruse menus, order, and wait for your food. For another, at buffets you have total control over what you eat. Once I was old enough to serve myself my mother was no longer involved in my food choices when I was at a buffet. And the desserts – oh, the desserts. I especially loved it when they had a ‘build your own sundae’ station. So. Good.

There are a few food items that seemed to be staples at the buffets I frequented in my childhood. These were not what you would call fine cuisine. But all the same I loved them. Some of my favourites were jelly salad (shredded cabbage in green jello), meatballs, cheese cubes, and those oven roasted potato wedges. Oh, and pickled herring. Yes, I love pickled herring. I might have been a picky eater at home, but at a buffet I piled my plate high with foods that didn’t remotely belong together. And of course, I always took seconds.

Photo courtesy Matt Hinsa on Flickr

I seem to remember more buffet restaurants dotting the landscape of my hometown back in the ’80s. Only they were usually called smorgasbords or salad bars. (Although once a ‘salad bar’ includes fried chicken and cheesecake I think you’ve crossed the line, myself.) I’ve considered the possibility that they’re still around and I just don’t eat at the same sorts of restaurants anymore, but I don’t think that’s it entirely. Places that used to have them, like the Keg or even Wendy’s, don’t anymore. I think it’s actually a shift, at least in my area.

Perhaps the demise of the buffet is related to increasing concerns about food safety. I wouldn’t doubt it, those fears are probably well-founded. Keeping the food sufficiently hot and preventing cross-contamination isn’t easy. Google ‘buffet food poisoning’ and you’ll find more alarming articles than you can shake a stick at. Or perhaps it’s one too many university students viewing the ‘all you can eat’ promise as a personal challenge. I don’t really know.

Of course there are some areas where the buffet is still going strong. The Indian buffet has become a local mainstay. Las Vegas buffets are legendary. And brunch. Oh, the buffet brunch. Two meals in one, and always lots of hash browns. I do love a good hash brown. Sometimes they even have omelette stations. Really, what’s not to love?

I’m feeling rather nostalgic. Although I will concede that the food quality at many of my childhood buffets was sorely lacking. It’s sort of like fast food, really. On the one hand, it’s neither good nor good for you. On the other hand, it’s sort of comforting. As it is, with their disappearance my memories will have to do. Which is possibly for the best – I’m sure that real life and lukewarm potatoes would pale in contrast to my own recollections.

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