AIBU to ask for your "All You Can Eat" restaurant tips?

[Goldenbug]

I'm visiting an establishment in a few weeks that offers an "all you can eat" buffet type deal of foods from around the world. How can I get my money's worth?

Avoid fizzy drinks I assume. Don't want Co2 taking up precious stomach room.

Should I have a big meal the day before to prepare?

Eat slow?

Tips please. I want the restaurant to remember my visit as "Run Out Of Food Saturday".

stick wins the thread for me

Who takes a Tupperware box to any restaurant??

I want more pictures of Augustus Gloop!!

The most pleasurable part of going to a restaurant, for me, is sitting in a comfortable chair and being waited on. Could not be arsed jumping up and down every ten minutes to get my own food. I could do that at home

Oh and I would avoid the rice dishes entirely. I never trust rice at a buffet.

If anyone goes to Prague there is an all you can eat pizza and pasta place. It's not a buffet instead they bring around plates of freshly cooked pizza an pasta and you choose if you want it. It was fabulous and highly recommended

Who takes a Tupperware box to any restaurant??

To go off thread a bit, many years ago (I am old) when the first Indian Restaurants here offered takeaway you took your own containers labelled it with what you would like it to be filled with. I'd go with my Dad and sit at the bar gazing at the sumptuous wallpaper drinking a lemonade. It was lovely .

Who ate you? Adam fucking Richman?

What?

Heman what a lovely memory for you

Buffet city in Plymouth is fab. Great choice of food and it's always busy so nice and fresh.

It is Daily . I can also remember going to the same restaurant for a meal. Sitting at a cosy banquette, being waited on and served delicious food . And going to one of the only Chinese restaurants with lots of shouting staff who rolled extra tables down the restaurant when more customers came in .

Don’t do it. Stay home. It is the most revolting display or greed, waste and poor manners you’ll ever come across. It’s not a dinner, it’s an exercise in watching people shovel food in their mouths to get their ‘monies worth’.

Next time I go to one, I'm going to see if I can spot a few catsbumfaces around me.

The most pleasurable part of going to a restaurant, for me, is sitting in a comfortable chair and being waited on. Could not be arsed jumping up and down every ten minutes to get my own food. I could do that at home

^This. It's also not very sociable in a group because everyone^ is constantly getting up and down to seek out more food although it can be good for a work event where if you get accosted by Mr Boring you can escape by getting up for more food.

It's also why I don't like AI holidays, at a level that I am willing/able to pay for anyway. I don't mind (and quite enjoy) a buffet breakfast, but for lunch and dinner I want to go for a walk, have a couple of drinks and sit down and be waited on, and eat in a variety of different restaurants. And AI that offers that sort of experience is generally very expensive, so we generally go B&B or SC and eat out instead.

Buffets are great. I love a buffet. It is nice to choose.

It is the attitude that I want to stuff myself indiscriminately with as much as I possibly can in order to get "my money's worth". It is the attitude that I might "miss out" if I don't gorge myself.

When I have people over I almost always do a buffet - especially if I have DCs friends over. It solves the "who can't eat what" problem. But is not an "all you can eat" and I wouldn't expect people to be gorging and stuffing themselves everything insight regardless of how full they were. That's all

Ah. Cosmo. People watching paradise.

Don’t do it. Stay home. It is the most revolting display or greed, waste and poor manners you’ll ever come across. It’s not a dinner, it’s an exercise in watching people shovel food in their mouths to get their ‘monies worth’.

^This. These type of buffet places have low quality food and cheap desserts.

The DCs used to LOVE Jimmy’s in Brighton marina. Their curries and Chinese dumplings were the only things worth eating and I had a sore tummy after every visit. IME these places can’t make a loss because their drinks are so expensive even if you make a single drink last throughout the meal. The desserts are never worth any tummy space.

Jimmy’s didn’t last long in Brighton, wonder why (genuinely, it was always packed)

OP, eat what you want to eat. The cost is the same no matter what, so there's no gain to you in trying to make the restaurant spend more money.

I went Zaa zaa bizaare in bristol once, absolutely fantastic place! Didn’t last the full 1h and 45m allocated but had curry, Chinese, sushi, a slice of pizza, nachos and 4 mini puddings.

Tempted to drive there one day next week now I’ve mentioned it!

I adore all you can eat, and am I big fan of the better-quality-but-more-expensive brazilian bbq places that have appeared in the last 5 years as well - I love the decadence of having samosas AND lasagne AND curry all at once!

Top tip is make sure you have a small meal for lunch, on the days I've skipped lunch entirely because I knew I would be having a big dinner, my appetite was definitely smaller because of it. And as everyone else said, dont fill up on carbs - just because your mum would frown at you having no rice/veg with your mains, doesnt mean you're not allowed!

I know a lot of people have mentioned greed, but you could aim to try as many dishes as you fancy. Just a small portion of everything so you get to try different dishes

We are doing Cosmo for xmas work do this year (assume it's the same place)... It's already making me want to vom. Kevin* from IT will a finger licker, I can see it already.

*NC to protect the guilty

I hate these places and would have to be dragged kicking and screaming into one, just watching someone fill a salad bowl to overflowing in a Harvester is enough to put me off!

I think I'm scarred from a visit to a family diner buffet place in the States. It was a sight to behold and I never want to witness anything like it again! Apart from the gargantuan plates of what I thought were the main courses for some people, but were in fact just the beginning of starters, my kids couldn't get over the drinks. 'Mummy, why are those people drinking out of a bucket' comes to mind. Then there was the bowls for tower sized dessert the size of a mixing bowl bowl filled with help yourself whippy icecream out of a machine drowned in sweets and chocolate each one enough for a family of four.

I would be fine helping myself to some food I liked at a buffet but I can't stand seeing the greed to be honest and I love my food believe it or not.

@MiraiDevant get a grip.