Whats your buffet etiquette ?

Went to a 40th on sat with a buffet ate way to much !

Sunday went to a Bat mitzvah with a buffet and ate way to much !

I quite clearly have rubbish buffet etiquette…

What’s your strategy ?

Mine is what you did. 🙂

Buffets are 17% urine: fact.

Have no shame.

Get in quick and eat until my vision goes funny.

My achilles heel 🙁

Hover and chat, so you’re in primary when the hot stuff comes out.

Don’t eat crap like sandwiches and things that you can have any day. Go for little samosas, spring rolls, chicken wings, mini sausages (as long as they’re hot) – stuff that you can’t generally be arsed to cook yourself.

Don’t under any circumstances put little strips of red and green pepper dipped in hummus on your plate. 1/ someone will have double dipped it, so that’s tantamount to snogging them; 2/ this is a buffet; food is supposed to be shades of beige.

Now, what about the all you can eat pan asian type buffet? Do you mix your cuisines? Indian style and Thai style curries on one plate? Are stir fried noodles an acceptable accompaniment for curry?

I like to work up an appetite with a solo century and then go in all guns blazing.

Twiglets. All of them.

Grab the good shit first and come back for seconds….

Tend to have something to eat before I go

Vol au vonts sausage rolls quiche etc I fricken hate that stuff 🙂

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=beat%20the%20buffet
Howard in Fresh Meat sets it out well.

1. Positioning: close to the buffet. Minimising plate travel and ensuring prime position for refills.

2. The first round: just one of each item. This is the introductory taster plate; we don’t want to waste stomach space on non-tasty items.

3. Round 2: maximise high value items eg. prawns, over low value bulk foods such as rice or noodle. Remember the aim is not to have a satisfying meal out, the aim is to beat the buffet.

4. When you feel like you can’t eat anymore: bring out the transporter. *Proceeds to tip a large plate of noodle into a rucksack lined with a plastic bag.

It’s all about the high value items, not rice.

1) Eat far too much
2) Go back and get some more

I didn’t stop eating from about 7pm to midnight on saturday. Carb loading innit.

The etiquette on this one is simple.
Don’t ever go near a buffet or a carvery. That includes hotels that serve buffet breakfast.

Even “worse” than the traditional buffet is those Brazilian “we keep bringing you meat until you tell us to stop” places.

You learn quite a lot about yourself after an evening in one of those.

I’d echo the above I think. Keep filler items (noodles, rice, chips, crap sarnies, etc.) to a minimum, you want to fill up on the tasty stuff instead.

I, perhaps controversially, always have a smaller plate first time round to get a feel for the food, work out what is good and what is not. I also think that you tend to get a restocking of food so if you time your second visit to coincide with this you get a fresh stock of the stuff that you liked from the first visit.

Finally, make sure you pick your beverages correctly. This is not the places for fizzy pints of lager as they will take up valuable stomach space, this is the place for shorts, ideally with a flat mixer.

Bring your own big plate, keep it in your room 🙂

I am so glad it’s not just me with zero self control at buffets 😆

I’d second those Brazilian never ending meat places.
3 hours we were in there. Never stopped. 2 guys ended up in the loo. Its so hard to leave your card red when they bring the next skewer. After all… What if that one doesn’t come round again?

stretch or starve

I’ve found that since I started cycling, i’m rarely full.

Buffets become the ultimate challenge. Pizza hut buffets normally end in the high teens in terms of slices, normally followed by laying on the sofa all afternoon.
There’s a multi cuisine buffet near me (Cosmo) where you can go nuts on all manner of foods. Entertaining to sit down with a full roast at plate number 4 after sushi, chinese and curry. I often like to include a theme at this venue – such as “foods beginning with the letter S”.

Bring your own big plate, keep it in your room

You are Alan Partridge and I claim my £5…

A group of us got asked to leave an all you can eat pizza place as there was nothing left for any other customers…

My strategy – never take more than what I can eat.

1st round is to sample taste all.

2nd round go for the ones that I like most with full plate.

3rd round go for the ones I think I like but not full plate.

4th round a bit of this and that not full plate

5th round go back for the ones I like most but not full plate.

6th round dessert.

My philosophy with buffets is…

“The more you eat, the cheaper they get”

Ensure you peruse the entire selection before stocking up. Nothing worse than filling yourself up on boring stuff only to spot the good stuff when it’s too late.

Went to a Hindu wedding a while back. Was told that the buffet selection was the main food, so tucked in heartily, only to be too full when the amazing curries and bhajis started to appear. Gutted.

Goggles on elbows out ….

Go to the desert section first and locate the fruit bowl. Remove fruit and take bowl as your buffet plate. Stack it high and enjoy!

why not, er y’know, eat a normal portion… ?

this would mean you don’t have to push the seat in your audi A4 right back to get your belly in behind the steering wheel and you also don’t need the shock pressure right up to the max on your Orange5

[runs away]

🙂

Working on conferences means a lot of buffet lunches. It’s not been unknown for me to have potatoes, rice, pasta and bread all on the same plate.

Blokes eh? 🙄

@edhornby – whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on a minute… Nobody here actually rides bikes.

why not, er y’know, eat a normal portion… ?

Which would completely defeat the purpose of going to a buffet?

*non audi driving, non orange riding, 70kg, 13%BF, buffet lover* 🙂

Apparently if you eat slowly your stomach will tell you that you’re full earlier.

So you ought to eat really quickly at buffets before your brain catches up and realises what’s happened.

My Buffy etiquette is not to forget about Willow

IGMC

So, now we’ve sorted the catering for the next forum get together…..

Only rule I apply is, if you put it on your plate you’ve got to eat it.
Nothing worse than those “eye’s bigger than their bellies” types leaving half eaten plates all over the place 👿

Rule No 1: Don’t go all “experimental” and mix foodstuffs that have no right being in contact, whether it be on your plate or in your mouth. Go for tried and tested combos or else you will be leaving half-eaten plates around the place, leading to that embarrassing moment when someone asks “who’s is this plate and what were they thinking?”