I’ve been told here (I forget by whom) that the BMI does not work at extremes. The BMI would have me in the happy zone at 11 stone - skinny as a rake. Mass (and therefore weight) is related to your volume, which is proportional to the cube of your height.
The restaurant and patron should have adopted the Simpsons solution:
"Come, see Bottomless Pete! Nature’s cruelest mistake - come for the freak, stay for the food … " 
[QUOTE=Arnold Winkelried]
I think I read this in a similar thread on the subject at the SDMB before, but “buffet” restaurant does not necessarily mean “all you can eat”. Buffet means “food served on a buffet table and you can go help yourself.”
So it would depend on what the signs inside the restaurant said.
Unless the restaurant explicitly said “all you can eat for the low price of XXX” then they are within their rights to charge people more, or tell a customer that s/he is eating too much of the expensive items.
[/QUOTE]
AP, via WDSU, New Orleans:
Maybe they could just make the door narrower.
[QUOTE=Swallowed My Cellphone]
What makes me go :dubious: was that the “hefty patron” complained that the restaurant “only bregrudgingly cooked more seafood” when the buffet table ran out. Jeebus, what do people expect? Were they supposed to go grocery shopping too?
[/QUOTE]
That reminds me now of a sci-fi short story, in which the guy eating at the AYCE buffet was actually an alien who was somehow transmitting the food he ate back to starving companions back home. The chef and staff were tearing their hair out trying to make enough food to keep up with the patron’s requests, and ended up going shopping after they’d thawed and cooked everything in the freezer…
The last time I saw an AYCE situation - no buffet, but “unlimited” sushi/sashimi - the restaurant said you had to eat everything you ordered on the spot, or else you would be charged the a la carte prices for the leftovers. That seemed to do a pretty good job of curtailing the folks who would order tons of stuff, and then ask for a doggie bag to bring home the extras they never really meant to eat at that meal. :rolleyes:
[QUOTE=Jean Gray]
The last time I saw an AYCE situation - no buffet, but “unlimited” sushi/sashimi - the restaurant said you had to eat everything you ordered on the spot, or else you would be charged the a la carte prices for the leftovers. That seemed to do a pretty good job of curtailing the folks who would order tons of stuff, and then ask for a doggie bag to bring home the extras they never really meant to eat at that meal. :rolleyes:
[/QUOTE]
Reduces the experimentation likely to happen at a sushi place as well.
[QUOTE=elmwood]
From the article:
“I ain’t that fat, I only weigh 277”
Is this where we are now? 277 pounds (126 kilograms) is “ain’t that fat?”
[/QUOTE]
277 is pretty big, but for a man who’s 6’3", he’s not huge. Sixty, seventy pounds overweight - it’s a problem, but it’s not comically fat. Look at the video of John Pinette, linked earlier; at the time Pinette probably weighed 375, maybe 400 pounds. (He’s lost a lot of weight recently, I have been told.)
[QUOTE=Dangerosa]
The cost of doing business needs to get passed onto the customer or you no longer have a business. The buffet has only a few choices:
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Charge enough to everyone so that it doesn’t make any difference if you get 20 18 year old boys, the Packers defense line, and three sumo wrestlers - your business will still be profitable. This will probably mean you aren’t competitive with other buffets in town and will go out of business.
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Place reasonable limitations around your buffet and reserve the right to limit service or quantity, surcharge, or whatever you need to do.
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Simply chalk it up as “the cost of doing business” and wait until you declare bankrupcy because you’ve run out of money to buy more crab legs.
As a business model, all-you-can-eat buffet is going to be a tough one. The food is seldom really great - so its going to mostly appeal to people who want quantity and are looking for value. That’s likely going to mean slim margins. There is going to be an incredible amount of waste. There do seem to be some exceptions - I seldom see ridiculous gluttony at an Indian buffet - and the food is pretty good, too.
[/QUOTE]
What about that chemical stuff buffets inject their food with to make people think they’ve filled up quicker? I know CiCi’s Pizza is reputedly known for doing this.
How many times do we have to tell you this! Don’t start threads asking why someone got banned, it’s usually because the person is a troll or a sock puppet! If you want to know why Beefy Buffet Browser got banned, email a moderator!
What?
Oh… NEVVVVer mind!
[QUOTE=Skylark]
It happens to sailors sometimes. But we’re rowdy folk, and I alone can eat a family of four under the table in fifteen minutes.
[/QUOTE]
Wow, those AYCE buffets really do serve everything. Wouldn’t eating on top of the table be easier and more sanitary, though?
[QUOTE=Lightray]
Wait… that is what all this “biodiversity” the media keeps chirping on is about? Fat people and skinny people?
Well. Good to know.
[/QUOTE]
No, that’s what you inferred through some rather disingeuous and cruel sarcasm. I am talking about all creatures Great and Small. And there is no hard line other than that which you arrogantly impose. As soon as you set a rule, quantum probability and biology will defeat it.
[QUOTE=Skylark]
What about that chemical stuff buffets inject their food with to make people think they’ve filled up quicker? I know CiCi’s Pizza is reputedly known for doing this.
[/QUOTE]
Frankly with the prices CiCi’s charges, I wouldn’t be surprised to find out there food was actually flavored packing peanuts. I can’t feed my dog for what CiCi’s charges. But I have higher standards for my dog.
[QUOTE=Wee Bairn]
I have zero restaurant knoweldge but even I knew Red Lobsters AYCE crab was doomed, when you consider the price per pound and that the average crab leg has about what, a half ounce of meat? The average person can eat a 16 oz. steak, and that would equal how many crab legs- 20? 50? Even light eaters I went with would get thirds, minimum, just to get reasoanbly full.
[/QUOTE]
I’d be surprised that the “average” person could eat a full pound of beef; that’s typically 3-4 servings.
All average people can eat pounds of meat. That is our evolutionary advantage.
[QUOTE=devilsknew]
All average people can eat pounds of meat. That is our evolutionary advantage.
[/QUOTE]
Sure. But if you take a plains ape’s ability to gorge itself stupid on the one occasion in six weeks it gets the chance to, and couple that with the modern superabundance of food in the Western world, you’re heading for trouble quicker than you can say “Are you gonna eat the rest of that?”. It’s wiser to leave off at a third of a pound.
[QUOTE=MissGypsy]
I’d be surprised that the “average” person could eat a full pound of beef; that’s typically 3-4 servings.
[/QUOTE]
Yeah, but if youre gorging at a buffet, and the steak has a bone and fat and is cooked that 16oz turns into about 8.
[QUOTE=devilsknew]
No, that’s what you inferred through some rather disingeuous and cruel sarcasm. I am talking about all creatures Great and Small. And there is no hard line other than that which you arrogantly impose. As soon as you set a rule, quantum probability and biology will defeat it.
[/QUOTE]
I’ve seen many dubious allusions to quantum theory, but this is the first time I’ve seen it cited as a justification for human obesity.
[QUOTE=Vinyl Turnip]
I’ve seen many dubious allusions to quantum theory, but this is the first time I’ve seen it cited as a justification for human obesity.
[/QUOTE]
It is impossible to know both how fat a buffet patron is, and whether he is headed toward the crab legs or the lasagna, at the same time.
[QUOTE=Wee Bairn]
Yeah, but if youre gorging at a buffet, and the steak has a bone and fat and is cooked that 16oz turns into about 8.
[/QUOTE]
Which is still 2.67 times the recommended portion size for meat. 3 oz. Just a little teeny tiny 3 oz.
[QUOTE=Vinyl Turnip]
I’ve seen many dubious allusions to quantum theory, but this is the first time I’ve seen it cited as a justification for human obesity.
[/QUOTE]
I’m not citing it as a cause for obesity, I am citing it as a cause for biodiversity, which may or may not include a propensity for obesity. Our genes are at base quantum functions.