SoroSuub1

We have a lot of AYCE sushi places in Toronto, Canada and surrounding suburbs and they often have a 90 minute time limit to protect themselves in case you're too unprofitable or if there are lots of people.

Badenoch

The nearest ACYE sushi spot to me has a time limit. They also have an ala carte menu and the made to order food tends to be fresher and better presented. The portions are much larger than the same order AYCE and the price is not that different.

I've found the same at Indian restaurants. Dishes ordered from the menu are better than whatever slop is ladled into the trays on the steam tables.

I'd rather eat less and better.

dchristiva

This was the first thing to cross my mind when I read the story, too! Makes me suspicious of the rationale.

RIP, John Pinette! ^

dolcevita

Down here they tend to use the lunch buffet to showcase the menu, excluding premium items like lamb kabobs, as a way of expanding diners' familiarity and thereby driving dinner sales. Often they'll even feature dishes on the buffet that are nowhere on either menu.

If the quality of an Indian buffet isn't good, I certainly wouldn't go back for dinner there.

pseudoswede

I remember his stand-up routines from the late 80's/early 90's where he introduced that bit. He also did it when I saw him open for Frank Sinatra & Shirley MacLaine in 1992. And he was still doing similar bits up until his death. Never got old.

CMK10

We've got an Indian buffet like that in Chapel Hill. They usually have three meat entrees, two vegetable ones, salad and dessert. Unlimited rice and naan are also provided and it's only $13.99 per person. I've never come back for dinner but I go for lunch frequently, especially as the meat options rotate.

emma69

We have a number of Indian places near my office that offer lunch buffets - I rarely go, as I rarely take lunch unless it is a working / client lunch (in which case we are not heading to an Indian buffet!) I have been a few times though, and I like the variety, I won't eat more than if I was ordering a la carte, but it is nice to have half a spoonful of this daal, half a spoon of that potato curry, a small piece of garlic naan, a small scoop of rice, etc. In fact, my most common order when I don't go to buffets is to order the vegetable thali, an a la carte version of a buffet!

milepig

My FIL was a hearty eater.

We were out with him and MIL one time and he ordered the "all you can eat" crab legs. Not a buffet, but a served meal place.

Round one -regular serving.
Round two - regular service.
Round three - a scanty plate of crab leg bits and pieces.

FIL started to complain. MIL took his hand and quietly said "they're saying you've had enough dear, I agree."

End of discussion.

KoKoBuddy

This was a Simpsons story line. Life imitating art.

milepig

Well, this happened before the Simpsons, so I guess art imitating life!

nrr

They raised the price to $100

Many buffets (Bellagio in LV, for example), note: "thank you for dining no more than 2 hrs" [or some equivalent phasing]

weltfrieden

Do they serve real champagne or sparkling white wine? Big difference.

My friends took a road trip last year and they stopped at that famous
AYCE lobster buffet in Rhode Island. IIRC, each person was about
$90(?). They each had at least a dozen freshly-steamed big lobsters.
One of them had 21 lobsters and nothing else, in under 60 minutes.
Well worth the money... maybe.

Edit: this one http://www.nordiclodge.com/pricing.htm

Jay71

We did the $90(?) Four Seasons Surf, Sand, and Stars Buffet (no longer available) on the Big Island a few years back. We tried to get our money's worth eating a lot of the higher end items like the lobster tails but I still don't think we got our money's worth. We had a handful of lobster for example but after eating a few, it started getting repetitive and we just had to try the as many of the different items as we could. No regrets though as it was a nice experience overall. Would love to give Bally's Sterling Brunch a try.
No time limit here of course but there was a line to get a table if you didn't have a reservation.

nrr

The STERLING BRUNCH serves Perrier-Jouet; they use lobster TAILS (when I first went to the SB, 10 years ago, they served FULL lobsters).
Many buffets serve all you can eat JUNK (poorly prepared, low quality items). The SB has high quality, well prepared items.
Minor point, they have 4 or 5 type of mustards (in the cold-cut cheese area), indicative (to me), this is an UPSCALE brunch.

CKA1

My grandfather would be asked by various buffet restaurant owners to leave after he had a plate of food or even not come in. He was a traveling salesman for much of his life and had a route he would travel across Canada to sell his product (high end bespoke clothing), take measurements and deliver his product. He ended up having his own clothing line and many customers who would order again and again. He learned to get by on a single good meal a day, and ate junk food a lot of the time. He wasn't a glutton, but if he was getting a steak meal, he wanted the steak, the fries, the veggies an a coffee, all at a good price. He would drive an hour to go somewhere where the food was good. I didn't really know him till after he was in his 50s, but he liked the Bonanza chain.


He was a great salesman, tailor and manager, and he really enjoyed a buffet. There was always some place he liked to stop in at. He would always tell me not to spend 69 bucks for a motel room, that I should sleep in my car or find some place where the toilet was down the hall and they wanted fifteen bucks a night.

This man always liked the things that just came with a buffet. He would drive to Vegas and really loved the big hotels buffets. I remember taking him to a really nice steakhouse in my hometown and he filled up on free bread, because after all, it was free. I bought him a hundred dollar steak and he took most of it home. Just developed a different attitude as he got older. He was never cheap, but he liked to eat well, and he knew the spots for a good feed.

He sure knew that if he was paying 14.99 on a AYCE buffet, he wasn't going to fill up on rice and noodles.

Chuck.