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Why Did It Take a Pandemic to Make Us Realize Buffets Are Disgusting?
A modest proposal for an infinity ban on hot plates, mass-market buffets, and other gross Petri dishes of communal eating
For a fleeting moment, the manager of the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., held onto hope that people would still be excited to chow down at an overpriced hotel Easter buffet: “Get ready for a HUGE celebration in a few weeks,” Mickael Damelincourt tweeted in earnest on March 24, making a reference to a $130-a-head brunch buffet the hotel hosts every Easter Sunday. His message was roundly mocked and then deleted. When I called the hotel to ask if buffet tickets were still available, the woman who answered the phone shared the unfortunate news that the event had been canceled.
The decision to even offer the buffet during this time might seem like typical Trumpian behavior: A buffet? With the coronavirus outbreak in full swing? But Trump-connected properties weren’t the only establishments that seemed to think customers wouldn’t have any problem gathering together to dine from an elegant trough of food in the middle of a global pandemic.
On March 10, when some local health officials began to warn that Covid-19 wasn’t an abstract threat but imminent, Caesars Entertainment said it would keep the buffets at its Las Vegas casinos open for the time being, breaking with competitor MGM Resorts, which decided that same week to suspend buffet service. Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman sided with Caesars: “For MGM to buy in and have the fear — that’s not the right direction,” she told a local newspaper. On St. Patrick’s Day, Nevada’s governor eventually stepped in and ordered all restaurants, casinos, and bars on the Strip to shut down for 30 days.
“People will literally pick off the hot bar and salad bar with their hands to sample things.”
Over the weekend of March 13, Whole Foods shoppers across the country were also surprised to find that the hot food and salad bars were still open. “I think they’re just slow adjusting to the new normal,” a shopper at Whole Foods’ Columbus Circle location in Manhattan told me. Most shoppers kept a respectful…
