jennings rampage

Warning: Gratuitous Putnam References

For some reason (I’m an obnoxious smartass), people seem to enjoy catching me when I contradict myself. So it’s not uncommon for someone who listens to me bitch about what I’ll eat and sees me turn up my nose at all sorts of food call out and question why I love Golden Corral so much. I’ll tell you why: it’s because Golden Corral is fucking awesome.

You may not be familiar with Golden Corral; it seems to have the most market penetration in the South and Midwest, as the list of restaurants on their professional-looking website would indicate, and its corporate headquarters are in Raleigh (Ross, field trip!). But franchises are available, so you have little excuse not to bring this experience closer to you.

Golden Corral specializes in an all-you-can-eat buffet, featuring rotisserie chicken, steak, burgers and dogs, pot roast, roast beef, barbecued pulled pork — solid American food. Well, throw in some tacos, but that’s about as exotic as it gets. There’s a salad bar with a good selection of fresh fruits and vegetables, but all that’s just a warmup for the coup de grace: the Brass Bell Bakery and its unapologetic and downright shameless glut of fresh-baked cakes, pies, cookies, brownies, and little fudgie things. An ice cream machine is also available.

When you enter the restaurant, you’re immediately drawn into a winding, amusement park-style line up to the drink station. Anything you’d like is served up in a twelve ounce tumbler, which you place on your tray and push down to the register. Then it’s the economist’s wet dream: a pure head tax to gain access to the restaurant’s services. (Well, it’s slightly progressive, seniors and children pay less, but let’s just pretend.)

Most Golden Corrals are divided into these three major sections, with the hot foods centering around the grill station and the spinning birds on the rotisserie, and the salad bar and the Brass Bell Bakery with their own islands. Don’t worry about getting lost, because each station has colorful signs to let you know what you’re looking at, and mock road signs point the way to the other stations, in case you’re not able to see twenty feet in front of you. The salesmanship doesn’t stop once you’ve paid your way in; with all the colors and signs and intrarestaurant advertisements and product placements, these stations are competing with each other for room on your plate. Fortunately, you may have as many plates as you’d like.

Like any successful chain restaurant, the Golden Corral is, at its peak, a machine. You’re directed and guided by ropes and fixed queues in every corner of the restaurant, each station is fully staffed — never an empty tray of food on the buffet, steaks always on the grill, fresh vegetables being chopped behind the salad bar, a red velvet cake being iced at the Brass Bell. You have a waitress to refill your drink and offer hot yeast rolls and bring you clean plates and clear the old ones. You’re never rushed, but you’re never waiting needlessly.

Everyone loves Golden Corral: young and old; lower class and lower middle class; black, white, and everything in between. You’re sure to see a dozen families with grandma in tow, a few businessmen grabbing a quick bite, teenagers and young adults off on their own, all building community around the ritual of the meal. No matter your age or your culture or your race or your salary, we all see the meal ritual as the centerpiece of our day, as a chance to check in with the people we love and connect and enjoy time with each other. Golden Corral makes that happen. Robert Putnam would love it. He and I could sit at our table for two and just marvel at how important community is and how beautiful it is to watch all day while our waitress keeps refilling our coffee and bringing us more rolls. Too bad Putnam’s at Harvard, where there are no Golden Corrals nearby. Maybe if he knew the wonder of Golden Corral, he wouldn’t be such a creepy social engineer. He wouldn’t need to be: the engineering has been done for us. The public has demanded it, and Golden Corral has stepped in to meet the need. Let’s get Putnam a franchise application.

Golden Corral is the Disney World of food. It’s nothing too bold, nothing too daring, packaged up and ready for the entire family — the time-tested things where we find comfort and routine served to us with the haunting illusion of choice and control over our destinies. It’s a place where no one is especially thrilled to be — mom wanted a nice salad, dad wanted a big steak, little Johnny wanted a hot dog and fries — it’s a shining monument to compromise, a place where, on paper, everyone can have what they want. It’s the socialism of food without that pesky “from each according to ability to pay,” but no shortage of the much easier “to each according to need.” It’s clearly an allegory for whatever you’d like. My coworkers don’t know it yet, but it’s where I’ll be having my office birthday party.