Children at a Buffet

Most buffets are family restaurants and of course, children are at the heart of most families. So it is most common to find children at buffets. As with many things that happen for the negative with children, it is not the child to blame but the parent who is not paying attention to what the child is doing. I have written an article about this same subject in what seems is the long past, but this absolutely needs repeating.

Now don't get all crazy that I don't like children at buffets. That is not true. What I don't like are children who are unsupervised when they are sent up by themselves to the buffet servers. Here are two recent occurrences.

At a certain buffet, not to be named, a boy about the age of nine or ten was up at the buffet server putting rice into his plate with the large serving spoon. He went to drop the rice into his plate and it would not release from the spoon. His first response was to put the spoon over the serving tray full of rice and with his other hand scoop the rice out of the spoon and back into the pan. He seemed to realize that this was not the thing to do, so he moved the spoon back over his plate - and then with this other hand scooped the rice out of the spoon and onto his plate. Of course, he then put the spoon - the serving end just rubbed out by his hand - back into the serving tray. Ycch.

At another buffet, again not to be named, another boy about the age of eleven or twelve, was serving himself from the entrees and sides into bowls. He filled a bowl full of mac and cheese - which is a reasonable amount for a child to eat. He then filled a bowl to overflowing with pieces of fried fish - more fish than two tables of adults could consume in a meal. Certainly, this young lad did not eat all of that fish!

So where were the parents? Good question. Too often children - at all ages of childhood - are up at the buffet server alone. Sometimes taking things on a buffet are not as simple as scooping a spoonful up and onto a plate. Sometimes the pizza needs to be cut apart to get a piece - as the restaurant did not quite cut it through all of the way. Sometimes, like our young boy above, the food does not release from the spoon all that easily. At these times many kids are at a loss for what properly to do - and they improvise. Those improvisations are not always with the best result.

Some buffets post signs. "No one 12 or under are to be at the buffet server unescorted." If only the kids cared or the parents bothered to make sure to follow that simple request.

I have brought a child to buffets myself, and when it is your child or one who is close to you, you will naturally believe that the child is far more capable than perhaps may be. I know that the child that I have brought will want to take everything for himself. At 7 years old, you want to believe that is ok, but I have seen kids take one serving spoon from one tray and go from tray to tray taking food. Sometimes it is a struggle when the child is insistent, but you know what, sometimes you have got to be the adult. Children's eyes are truly bigger than their stomachs - a kid will take far more than he/she can possibly eat. Is it so hard to teach the child to take a little and then go back for more? So silly of me, many adults never learned this.

There have also been problems with kids running around a buffet - especially around the serving area where people are walking with full and hot plates and do not always notice the the little ones scurrying by - alone or with similar aged siblings. I have seen kids just narrowly being missed by a knocked cup of hot coffee. And you know that if the child had been burned the person knocked into would be blamed. Why are the kids running around? Well, where are the parents?

I am not going to belabor this, but I hope that I have made my point. If you take a child to a buffet you need to be with that child when the child goes up to the serving bars - and when you are there fill the plate for a younger child and assist an older one, paying attention to what the child is doing.