Rude behaviour at buffets

[ChopstickNovice]

We are in Gran Canaria and it's been LOVELY. Not actually encountered any cheeky fuckery at all until this morning.

I was at the hot drink machine (one of 3 in a row) dispensing hot water into a teapot. A man came up beside me, paused my hot water, made himself a cappuccino and then walked off! Not a word. Didn't even look at me.

I mention that he was very old only because it maybe explains that he didn't realise I was there? But he was aware enough to stop the hot water, so....? Also there were two free machines right there!

I was so surprised I didn't say anything.

Please tell me your stories of buffet (all inclusive or otherwise) cheeky fuckery!

I got punched at a Toby carvery by a man who wanted the crispy bacon that had just been put out.

He'd already got a massive plate of food and was sat down and saw them coming out to put a new dish of bacon out, sprinted across the restaurant, grabbed a small toast plate, jumped the queue and just as its my turn at the bacon I felt this massive thump in the back of the head and looked around to see this guy stood there growling at me "it's my turn for the bacon I hardly got any, move"

That day I was very thankful for how protective my husband is

Not a buffet (sorry!) but when a colleague of mine was pregnant she took to having frozen ready meals for lunch (cottage pie, lasagna, that sort of thing) because she was ravenous. Went to check on the microwave one day and someone had taken her dinner out half way through and put theirs in, planning to put hers back in when they’d heated theirs. They said they were “really hungry”

You don’t try that sh*t with a pregnant woman 😂

Take it you have never been to a A/I buffet, the veggie/gf options are away from the ‘main food’ because of contamination etc
there are always other veg options in the main food

My FIL was a big churchgoer and had donated a lot of money to the church over the years. When he died the church had his memorial services and kindly offered to do the buffet. There were only about ten family members at the service and about 30 church friends.

The second the service ended the church friends charged off to the buffet, which was in a different room. The family were talking politely to the vicar etc. When the family got to the buffet there was nothing left at all. It was like a swarm of locusts had been.

Some family members had travelled a long way and had nothing much to eat - knowing there was going to be a buffet. We all ended up going to the chippy on the way back from the service.

Opposite problem, a family self catered buffet last month and the hosts were desperate to give away food at the end of the night, pounds of cheese, massive bowls of baby potatoes, dozens of baguettes. I did clock one far flung cousin going up repeatedly but I think 18 year old boys have hollow legs, ime! Massively over catered.

Opposite side of it, there's a big buffet place near us, regularly whole plates of eg prawns just dumped. People are idiots.

At an AI in Greece there was one woman who, like others have described on here, would wait while pancakes were being made, then take all 15 on her plate back to her table, leaving anyone else waiting another 5 minutes while they cooked the next batch. Most people were taking 1 or 2 at a time. I didn’t say anything because she wasn’t English. Thinking about it, I think she may have been Russian, just to add to the stereotype that seems to be forming here…!

This is wild! I hope the guy was kicked out??

There are have been threads on here before about this...the whole point of a buffet is that every dish is available for everyone. Lots of people are meat eaters but don't eat meat every single day at home...why should they be expected to eat only the meat dishes at a buffet?

Bit unnecessary. Personally I find if someone is monumentally rude, particularly in public, I can be so shocked that it takes me a moment to react. My brain is whirring, processing what's happened and working out what it's ok to say or do in response-that isn't ruder.

I'm not sure why everyone seems so shocked you didn't say anything.

When something completely unexpected happens to you thats never happened before and is not the social norm at all, I think it's quite normal for your brain to take a while longer to take it on, work out what's happening, and think of an appropriate response...by which time the man would have gone

My most frustrating was at a friend's celebration event. Everyone had been asked to make food for the buffet - whatever they liked. I made a lovely thai beef rice noodle salad (lots of it), and also a rich flourless chocolate cake. I don't have any allergies but I don't usually eat wheat / flour.

When the buffet started the event host declared that all the children were hungry and that they should go first - this included their parents to 'supervise' fill their own plates. My dc were adults by then so we were amongst the last to go. It was carnage. Food spilled all over table. I saw a child infront of me eat something from the serving spoon, then stick it back in the dish. All that was left wererejected some sausage rolls and a plate of sandwiches of which half looked as though someone had opened them to check the filling then put them back! In the end I had a small bowl of tomato soup and some mashed potato which was meant to accompany the haggis (long gone).

Ditto with the desserts when all that was left were the cupcakes with lurid icing and some fruit scones.

I survived but wasn't happy (good event and dancing though). I was quite surprised that this group of friends who are generally pretty attentive parents were so socially unaware in this situation. Of course when the plates were being cleared, there was lots left behind. I'd have cleared things off my own kids plates, but not other peoples!

It was a similar scrum when I was invited as a charity rep to the Queen's Garden Party. Allegedly it was the Vicars' wives, dressed in their finest, who led the raid on the strawberry tarts.

Oh do get a life 🙄

That's so annoying. I think in many hotels, when paella is served, there is often just a huge tray of rice and veg left, the ignorant have taken all the seafood without a thought for others.

A Las Vegas hoted fixed price buffet is a sociological study in itself. I spent a year working at Uni of Nevada so I had ample opportunity to observe them.

The plates are so big they are almost like trays. Despite this some people are greedy and pile their plates high with food, stopping at each option to take a sample and shuffling along. Some of them even go back for seconds and thirds. I used to walk along the line first, deciding in advance what I wanted to choose. I could never eat more than a main and two sides. Then I would get into the line, take a portion, and zip quickly along the back of the line to where the next desired portion was. I saw no point in shuffling along behind these greedy people and ending up with a cold meal at the end.

I worked in hosptality research and the buffet is deliberately organised so that you can do this. I once had an argument with some obscenely fat man who accused me of "cutting the line" whatever that is. Itold him "No, Im moving quickly out of the way so that greedy people can pile up their plates. We dont eat like that where I come from."

It does happen a lot but it's the fault of the buffet supplier and/or hosts for poor food choices. Even meat eaters are supposed to have at least 5 portions of veg per day and to strive for 10 so as a meat eater in any buffet I would be taking no more than a quarter of what I put on my plate from the meaty section and would fill the rest with things that are clearly plant-based. Buffets should generally be mostly vegetarian with optional add-ons for meat-eaters e.g. a pile of chicken legs, sausages etc - vegetable matter does not belong exclusively to vegetarians and you would have no right to ask me to suffer the digestive disaster that would happen if I just eat meat without a balance of vegetable-based items. If there's not enough veggie stuff do not blame your fellow guests it is not their fault.

Do you fancy yourself the MN thread police or something? threads evolve past the initial discussion point, that's sort of the whole basis of a social media forum, and, indeed, human conversation. Who are you to decide what direction it can or cannot take, and what it's 'really about' ? Everyone just posting about their own experiences in a long list without engaging with any other posts isn't really how a chat forum works - the clue is in the name - chat forum!

Besides which the thread is "about" rude behaviour at buffets. It's not like I started talking about my favourite TV show or the NHS waiting lists. My post was on topic, it just so happens that I think you, and the rest of your family, also exhibited 'rude behaviour at buffets' by not stopping your brother from acting like a complete dick.

Why did you bother sharing your story if you didn't want anyone to reply to it? Or would you have been okay with someone saying 'haha what a funny story,' but not with any vaguely critical comment?

I don't think it counts as thread policing to respond to someone rudely ticking everyone else off for how they post!

Of course I expected people to just post their stories back? Why wouldn't you?

You can also guarantee that those people would be the first to complain if the whole buffet was veggie. Ask me how I know!

Not a buffet, but similar behaviour. In pre-Covid days if it was your birthday at work you were expected to provide a selection of snacks for everyone to help themselves. We would all sit together in the work kitchen and chat as we ate.
As a sort of little birthday present, one year some of my colleagues bought me a big bar of chocolate, which I put down next to me on the table where we sat to eat at lunchtime (so not with the other food.)
At the end of lunch I stood up to leave and picked up the chocolate. One colleague (who was known for being frugal but also for taking more than their share) stopped me and said "can I just...", then proceeded to take the chocolate bar out of my hand, break it in half and take half for themselves!
I was so shocked I didn't know what to say.

AI in Spain - a huge paella was put out each night for customers to help themselves. One night it was garnished with perhaps 20 huge shell-on langoustine in a pattern over the paella. A lovely gentleman came up to the buffet and picked off all 20 langoustine from the dish, and didn't touch the paella at all.

That happened at a wedding I went to. We went up by table and by the time the final table went up (which had a lot of veggies and vegans), the only non-meat options were bread rolls. Really felt for them, we were in the arse end of nowhere and some were kids.

See my earlier post....we could have been in the same hotel.😆

When I get meat I'm not just going to eat meat, so yes I will take some veg, beans etc as well. It's there for everybody