Tackiest thing ever seen at a Disney Buffet

[Cannot_Wait_4Disney]

In fact, another poster on this thread related a story where a waiter asked the poster's mother or maybe mother in law if he should pour the coffee in her purse after he witnessed her put extra candy in there. What is it with these smart aleck waiters? I agree, tacky, tacky, tacky, but is it really necessary to embarass people like this?

Actually kudos to that waiter that made the coffee remark. More power to that one. A cookie or a roll is one thing. A purse full of gummy bears is another.

this thread is putting me off buffets!

This is nothing compared to what goes on in the kitchen of many restaurants.

 

[Cannot_Wait_4Disney]

Not at DW but at a local place called The Home Town Buffet. I don't know how other buffets handle it but at Home Time they staple a strip of paper to your receipt [you pay before you eat] and put the total number in your party on the strip. You place this strip on your table with the number facing up so the table staff knows how many should be at the table. When you are done you flip the strip over so the back is showing. This lets them know to clean up the table for the next group.
Well I went all by myself once and had my slip with the number 1 face up on my table. I first went and got a bowl of soup and a plate of salad. After I finished these I got up to get my main course, leaving my slip on the table as you're supposed to, along with my newspaper and my jacket and hat on one of the chairs. When I got back to my table 2 rather scrungy looking men were sitting at my table, without a slip of their own, eating off of 2 overflowing dishes of food. They had turned my slip face down so no one could see it was only for 1 and had put my newspaper, hat, and jacket on the floor under the table. I confronted them, placed my dish on the table, and went to get the manager. When we got back to the table they had gone.

Oh man!!! Too bad you couldn't have known exactly what they were doing before you confronted them and gotten management on the fly.

 

[maddhatir]

OMG! I really must live in a sheltered world or be oblivious to my surroundings- because i do not see any of this going on-- not that i visit buffets that often, however

you can be sure the next i do i will be looking out for these people!

 

[malibuconlee]

I was at the Boma Breakfast Buffet when I saw a grandmother and her grandson at the buffet in their pajamas!

I went for the George Strait Festival several years ago with a friend. It was at the football stadium in the college town my hubby went to. WE were eating breakfast in the hotel when a baseball team from another school started trickling in. Some in uniform, some in what must have been their 'jammies'. Some without shoes, some obviously with bed head. We just loked at each other and laughed. Obviously they were young enough and traveled enough that it just didn't bother them.


On topic, the week we moved we ate out a lot. We decided to try this Italian buffet that had been advertised one night. There was a family with 4 kids that came in toward the end of our meal. They had plate upon plate on their table. The mom let the kids take their dirty plates back up to the buffet instead of getting new ones. YUCK. They did something else that bothered me at the time, but I don't recall what it was now.

 

[Hollymom1229]

I wish there was some way to beat it into people's heads how important it is to not cross contaminate. I have a severe allergy to certain fish, worst being salmon. I've reached a point where I won't even try a dish on either side of a salmon dish, because I've seen so many people use the same spoon for more than one item. A few cases of hives, and clawing at my throat for breath is an amazing motivator. It's actually something I love at Disney buffets. If I explain this to the CMs they always get me some of the item from the back.

 

[My2Cinderellas]

for every incident in the front part of the restaurant at a buffet, there is at least one incident in the back/kitchen. I worked at a hotel restaurant that offered a salad bar, and expanded it to a full Seafood buffet on Fridays and brunch on Sunday. You REALLY don't want to hear the stories.

suffice it say that I do NOT eat at buffets, even now - 15 years later. FIL likes to take everyone out on Mother's Day, and even restaurants that don't normally have buffets feel the need to offer one, and won't serve off the menu. I was caught off guard by this last May, and sat there drinking my iced tea while everyone chowed down. yuck - the smell of eggs on a steam table still makes me throw up.

the only exception I've made to the no buffet rule was in Vegas, breakfast at Paris. But I was able to get fresh eggs, fresh crepes and fresh waffles to go with the yummy fruit and pastries.

we'll see how it goes in April - our first night is at 1900 Park Fare. it's all about meeting Cinderella, not the food!

 

[*Flower*]

We've done the breakfast buffet at Paris- and I was amazed at how FRESH everything was!

Each area had it's own chef and assistant (who was constantly cleaning/straightening their display areas) and cooked just about everything to order.

Yummy!

 

[jann1033]

How embarassing. Sure, Billy should have checked his shrimp intake, however, was it really necessary for the waiter to embarass him like that? C'mon, was the restaurant really going to run out of shrimp or was the waiter just trying to embarass poor Billy?

I agree ( sorry OT) as my 5'9, 150 lb son in law could probably match Bill shrimp for shrimp...if they want to limit it bring it to the table or have a sign limiting it. i would be ticked if a waiter did this to SIL and i sure wouldn't leave a tip. that's just rude imo and not his place to teach manners to anyone( not that he had any anyway or he wouldn't have said it)

and speaking of the "danger" what goes on in the buffet kitchen....
i thought of another ( non disney) one, not really tacky more funny. my daughter ( pregnant at the time) was out of town in Wichata and went to a breakfast buffet. she was "starving" and loaded up her plate, including waffles with powdered sugar and she added syrup. she sat down, took a giant bite of waffles and almost threw up...the waitress came over and asked what was wrong, she said "the waffles" . the waitress picked them up and took a good wiff... seems the chef had put garlic powder on the waffles in the kitchen instead of powdered sugar...the waitress said he had done the same thing the week before. funny thing is others who ate the " garlic " waffles thought they just tasted different "cause they were in Witchta Kansas"

 

[seashoreCM]

I . The mom let the kids take their dirty plates back up to the buffet instead of getting new ones. YUCK. They did something else that bothered me at the time, but I don't recall what it was now.

When I was in college (coupl'a decades ago) they apparently had not invented the "get a new plate" yet. The rule was to take your original plate back for seconds which were unlimited at the time. In fact they observed your plate as the proof of payment for the meal. One time, as I was about to leave, a friend took my plate to grab a free meal with.

My college has since switched to a-la carte meal pricing, or for some items, by the ounce pricing. The impetus for the change came with the beginning of co-education. The immediate complaint then was "girls don't eat as much as guys".

Disney hints:
http://members.aol.com/ajaynejr/disney.htm

 

[abk96]

On our first trip to WDW as a married couple we wne to the Biergarten (when it was group seating). We sat opposite an older couple from Long Island. They delivered us 4 pretzels as appetizers, the LI Women opened her purse and put all 4 in. Two of them were for us. Then our meal arrives and I head cheese on my plate. I swapped with DH and he ate most of the stuff, but not the head cheese. When DH was done the LI Women took his plate and cleaned it off into her purse. We were horrified. She told us that her husband gets hungry at night and she needs stuff to feed him. We still joke about them after all of these years.

No way!!! I'm literally falling off my seat laughing at this one! Too funny.

 

[WorldlyWise]

Grown woman at local buffet dipped her finger in the sauce and licked it, presumably to see if she wanted it. I asked her how it was and she seemed a little embarrassed (but no where near enough!).

KFC buffet - saw a man arrested after manager asked him to pay for the buffet. He had ordered a single peice of chicken and then proceeded to chow down. As they drug him out he just kept shouting, I paid for this, I paid for this!

 

[k_hase]

Not Disney and not buffet but in the same line of thinking...

My local supermarket has a gigantic bulk foods section, its well known that people eat candy or two while shopping and the store generally looks the other way. I was in the nut section, scooping my almonds with the appropriate scoop when a man came up next to me, lifted the lid on the macadamia nut container, stuck his hand in, pulled out a fistful of billion dollar a pound nuts and started eating them!

Now I'd have forgiven one nut, especially if he didn't rummage through the nuts, but its wasn't one and macadamia nuts are expensive so I nudged him and said "hey" in a very disapproving tone. He looked surprised (not that he'd been caught, but like he didn't know he was bothering anyone) and I told him not to do that because its gross and the more macadamia nuts he steals the more the price goes up.

Do you know what he said? "That's why he takes them"

 

[Lizzybee]

I dunno if this is tacky, it's not a buffet and I'm the possible "offender". We had lunch at CRT and part of my daughter's appetizer plate were wonderful red grapes. It was August so anything cool and fresh was like gold. So I took the grapes and carrot sticks. I had extra plastic baggies in my purse and they were great for a little burst of juice later in the day. Was I wrong to do that? I felt a little funny, but it's not a buffet, it's not like they could or should take the food from my table and serve it to someone else later anyway.
I'm with you guys on the spoon sharing gross out train. I don't eat anything that swims or oinks just because I don't like it. I have to look away when I get meat or turkey at the Old Country Buffet because they cut the different meats with the same knife and fork sometimes. Ick

 

[jennyf917]

No flames from me, how about an apology instead?
I'm sorry.
That is to all vegetarians and people with food allergies who eat at buffets.
I had never thought that these things could be issues for people.
I admit that as an omnivore I forget than not everyone can or wants to eat it all.
You have given me something to think about and I will definitely watch where the spoons go on buffets from now on.
Let people know- most of us who have mixed spoons probably never thought about it.

My DS is allergic to milk. It's not life-threatening, but he breaks out in eczema, and, occasionally, hives, which are terrifying. We don't really do buffets normally, and I never thought of the cross-contamination factor.


Jen

 

[Palerider4146]

Another non Disney story, but back when I was in college I was on the wrestling team. Of course, none of us had much money, and would scrounge for food money all the time. One of our middleweights used to leave his dorm room with a mostly empty large bag of potato chips and would return about half an hour later after storming the common kitchens and fridges on different floors and his bag on one occasion contained 12 pieces of cooked (still warm) fried chicken, carrots, jar of sauce, and a box of frozen ravioli. Best part about him was this guy was from one of the more affluent towns in New Jersey. Another one of my teammates, a 270 pound heavyweight, used to go to the food court on campus while wearing sweatpants. They had a Pizza Hut express stand their selling the personal pan pizzas. This guy, would "acquire" up to 10 of those pizzas by putting them down his sweatpants, then come down to the locker room and try to offer us some pizza. None of us ever took him up on it so he would eat all of them himself.

 

[waughzee]

Ok, this one is not tacky, but utterly disgusting! One time, my Mother, Sister and I, along with all of our children were having lunch at Old Country Buffet. A young family comes in and sits near us, baby in a highchair, couldn't have been a year old. They ripped open a packet of sugar and poured it on the table in front of the baby and let her have at it. She was rubbing it all over, licking her fingers, rubbing, licking, rubbing, licking. We were appalled to say the least and still talk about how gross that was!

 

[maddhatir]

I dunno if this is tacky, it's not a buffet and I'm the possible "offender". We had lunch at CRT and part of my daughter's appetizer plate were wonderful red grapes. It was August so anything cool and fresh was like gold. So I took the grapes and carrot sticks. I had extra plastic baggies in my purse and they were great for a little burst of juice later in the day. Was I wrong to do that? I felt a little funny, but it's not a buffet, it's not like they could or should take the food from my table and serve it to someone else later anyway.

i dont think that is tacky- it is your food and you already paid for it.....

i would say-- that one is OK.

 

[jennifer293]

Are you going to get any ice cream?

Nope I can't have the ice cream (diabetes) I wouldn't have it if I weren't diabetic though...

I didn't see anything too unusual other than folks "getting their money's worth". I watched a little girl probably 10 or so go to the dessert bar at least 5 times with a full plate of dessert each time around. I never saw her eat regular dinner food..

Saw an older woman at the salad bar and his plate of salad was HUGE and it was drowning in ranch dressing. She took the healthy factor out of that one REAL QUICK!!!!

Other than that it was a nice pleasant night with my mom and dad and my 2 girls!!!!!

 

[krismom]

At Breakfastasaurous last summer, the CM kept encouraging me to take the boxed cereal and bananas from the buffet out with us. She said they make great snacks for later.... so I did!

 

[Disney_Mama]

Some of the stories are just and some are Going to two buffets at WDW in two weeks. I will keep my eyes wide open. I really hope I don't see anything gross. If i do I'll do another post.