One of the last surviving chains from the golden age of Southern cafeterias is abandoning the classic cafeteria model for buffet-style service.

"It's a completely different experience from what folks have been accustomed to," Furr's Jill Gouge Laird says of the restaurant's new Fresh Buffet concept. "Now they really control the experience."

As recently reported by the Dallas Morning News, the Texas-based chain has opened nine Fresh Buffets over the last five years, and plans to open as many as a dozen additional stores by 2012. Existing restaurants will continue to operate as cafeterias, but Laird confirms all future outlets will be structured as "scattered buffets."

You know you've been tempted. Perhaps you've even offended. However, All You Can Eat Buffet prices are per person, y'all, no cheating.

Seriously. Just ask 40-year-old Dan Linscomb of Texas City, Texas, who was arrested last week for letting his girlfriend share his buffet plate and then refusing to pay.

Linscomb's brazen attempt to save $7 cost taxpayers many times that, as he was escorted from Iron Skillet in Atlanta to the cooler. The big cooler. The cooler with bars. The slammer. The iron bar motel. The joint. The clink. The pen. The pokey. Jail.

Linscomb served two days in the Fulton County Jail and was released after pleading guilty not to "theft of service," but the the lesser charge of "disorderly conduct."

[via San Francisco Chronicle]

When I was in college, one of the best things about being on the food service plan was that every Easter, Bon Appetit (the food service company at Whitman) would go all out and put together a fancy brunch for everyone who stayed behind that weekend. It would be held in the lobby of Cordiner Hall and there would be tables of pastries, made-to-order omelet stations and an absolute abundance of fresh, gently blanched asparagus. I would go every year in large part to binge on the asparagus, eating it until I could hold no more.

For some reason, the moment I saw this image of a bouquet of fresh asparagus, this memory of Easter asparagus in college is what my mind immediately conjured up. I don't have much in the way of Easter plans this weekend, but I do believe that I need to add "buy asparagus" to my shopping list.

When does a person get charged double what everyone else is charged for eating at a buffet? When that person is 6 foot 3 and 265 pounds.

A Louisiana man and his cousin have been banned from a restaurant because they eat too much. The two men had been eating at the Manchuria Restaurant in Houma at least three times a week for about eight months. On their last visit, the waitress gave them a bill for $46.40, which is almost double what the regular price is. When they asked why they were charged that much, the waitress said "Y'all fat, and y'all eat too much" (it helps if you picture Paula Deen saying it).

Police were called, and though the restaurant changed their mind and gave them the meal free, they still banned them from the restaurant.

If a group of Amish in Ohio have their way, Las Vegas may no longer hold the record for the world's largest buffet.

This past Saturday nearly 600 dishes were served up at the Amish Flea Market in Holmes County. More than 2,000 tickets to the gigantic feed were sold. Talk about your chow lines!

The bill of fare included Hungarian sauerkraut soup, corn casserole and garlic mashed potatoes. By noon 300 dishes had hit the tables; the number to beat was 510. It will be some time before the folks in Holmes County hear back from the powers that be at Guinness. So far there's been no word on how many pounds of scrapple and shoofly pie were dished out.

To avoid putting on the extra pound or two during the holidays, which are notorious for making large quantities of tempting and sometimes fattening foods readily available, all you really need to do is apply some common sense and avoid giving in to the excuses that the season offers.

• First and foremost, make sure to drink plenty of water. Not only will it offset the extra calories that you might consume if you were to drink only holiday drinks (eggnog, cider, cocktails, wine), but it will help fill you up and make you less likely to overeat in general.
• Don't stand near the buffet and nosh at parties. Take one plate full of what you feel that you should eat, then let it be. Try eating slowly over the course of the evening. It'll make you feel fuller.
• Before going out, especially if you know that your favorite fried latkes and other high-calorie favorites will be on the menu, eat a healthy snack to fill up. Try not to skip meals before on the excuse that you're going to eat a lot later. You'll eat less if you're not hungry when you walk in the door.
• If you're the one entertaining, make sure to have plenty of healthy snacks - low fat dips, veggies, etc - in addition to more decadent options so you give yourself and your guests a few good options. Look for lightened versions of favorite recipes (Cooking Light and Eating Well are good places to start), too.
• Last but not least, don't panic if you "give in" and have an extra slice of cheesecake or a few too many holiday cookies. One meal on one day is not enough to ruin your diet or your health, so it's not worth beating yourself up over. Keep a positive attitude and try to make better choices next time. • Be the designated driver. Stick with nonalcoholic drinks during a party and you'll save your friends and your waistline

A few weeks ago, I posted about a restaurant in England that had imposed a fine (donating all profits to charity) on people who took too much food at a buffet because the owners were sick about the amount of wasted. Several commenters thought that this was a great idea or knew of shops that did a similar thing in their neighborhoods. Perhaps more buffets will take similar action now that a Des Moines family was kicked out of an all-you-can-eat restaurant for wasting too much food.

The restaurant staff had been observing the family over the course of several visits to the restaurant. A Dragon House employee said "they just take one bite and throw it away. They take four egg rolls and crab rangoon, take one bite of egg roll and throw the whole plate. That is wasting food." The management reported that the family repeatedly took food, threw it out and then took more of the same food.

Growing up, many children are told to clean their plates during meals. This is partially because parents want their children to finish their vegetables and mostly because no one wants to waste food. The most popular reason to clean your plate? "Because there are children starving in Africa." Whether this sort of statement has an effect on children is difficult to say, but it did have an effect on a restaurant in London.

The Obalende Suya Express, a West-African barbecue restaurant, is enforcing a £2.50 fine for patrons whose eyes are bigger than their stomachs and leave food on their plates. They host an large, popular buffet every Sunday night and the restaurant owners noticed that people were taking food just because it was available, even if they had no intention of eating it. The owners said that they felt guilty dumping out all the wasted food at the end of the night. Now, large red signs warn the customers about the fine. The money collected from the fines goes to Oxfam, a poverty-relief charity.

The only downside? When customers learn to take only what they are willing to eat, the charity won't be getting as many contributions - not from this restaurant anyway. Other restaurants, including chains like TGI Fridays, donate food and goods to charity already, but perhaps this will encourage more business to do so when they can.

I hate buffets, but I have to say that if there were ratings or rankings for buffets, Vegas buffets would be at the bottom. They are the worst.

I won't necessarily go into why I hate buffets in general (and it's not just the typical sub-institution-quality of the food), but I do wonder what the appeal is of such monstrosities to people who go to Vegas. Is it just the sheer volume of food? The spectrum of different cuisines (though not too much variation in method - everything is fried)? Is there some social aspect of the "salad bar" that I've been missing?

Now, many people I know say that I must have been going to very bad buffets, and that there really are some good buffets in Vegas. The question is then, "Where?" Where are the good buffets in Vegas? Does such a thing really exist?

I am doubtful. It's still a buffet.

I've yet to find a Las Vegas buffet that I thought was truly good and offered sufficient variety. I've given up on trying. But I'm pretty sure that a recent 510-item extravaganza held at the Hilton to wish Alka Seltzer a 75th birthday would fit the bill. Not that I would haven be too happy about jostling at the carving station with the more than 850 people who turned out for the buffet, which Guinness World Records has certified as the largest ever.

George Bargisen, the hotel's executive chef, assembled an impresssive array of dishes, including salmon Wellington, fried alligator, Waldorf salad and crème brûlée. The spread was laid out on 500 feet of tables. No word on how much Alka Seltzer was given out.

[photo: AP/CNN]

In Taiwan, the patrons at Pizza Hut can only make one trip to the salad bar. This, my friend, is a challenge to any individual seeking to maximize their buffet experience. The patrons have become experts at stacking salad items, using cucumbers and carrots that would put any architect to shame. The real question is: do they really eat all of that?