You’ve probably at some point been to one of those Asian buffet restaurants, one where there are several tables worth of different dubiously processed items you can stuff your face with, which most people usually do so they feel like they’ve gotten their money’s worth.
We were at one yesterday.
Typically I’ll ignore most of the prepared stuff in favor of the salad / sushi / boiled shrimp and hot & sour soup. This one also had a hibachi, sometimes referred to as a “Mongolian,” grill. You select some vegetables and protein and they’ll quickly grill them with some sauce.
So I went through and picked some complimentary items with a few noodles and lots of bean sprouts, seasoned with some oyster sauce and soy sauce - basically a chow-mein of sorts.
While they were prepping it the guy behind me stepped up. His plate was heaped a good eight inches with piles of virtually everything they had along with not one but TWO eggs. There was no attempt to even think about how the flavors might work with each other, it was simply how much food can I pile on this plate at one time.
A prime example of:
Ah, I miss my days of buffet and mongolian.
Here in Canada, Mongolian Grills have different price points. Zero visits the the hot shield, One visit, and infinite visits. Students often choose the middle price, and eat about 1.5kg (3 lb) of precious protein for their discounted price.
I didn't like how they pressure diners to use noodles and sauce. I like my meat/fish blue, that is, close to raw. Warm but not set. I don't want a lot of nasty sauce interfering with the taste of the meat. It's not really nasty, but shrimp don't need a lot of help, esp if they're fresh.
As to boiled egg, I don't hate it, but why eat that at a buffet?