DroppedIn: Sunday Supper at the Sirloin Stockade

There's something about a buffet restaurant that's just so perverse it's elegant. It's orderless and yet so calculated. It's food meant to appeal to the masses and yet it so overwhelmingly inedible. Every individual imagines himself a craftsman. Everyone gets exactly what he thinks he wants. And yet none is satisfied. I adore a buffet restaurant, especially on that most familial of evenings. Sunday is the beginning and the end. A time of reckoning and preparation. There is no better denoument to a lovely weekend than bellying up to the hot bar and carving station with the people you love.

Ah, The Sirloin Stockade, a restaurant recently opened in Merida's North, across from Gran Plaza in the Chedraui parking lot. The concept is so tremendously terrible we simply had to try it. It manages to hit some of the finer points and misses in ways you might expect. The dining room is overloaded with tables and the lighting so garish even Cookie Jarvis would feel ashamed by a heaping plate and filthied napkins. Let's back up to the queue, where you're herded like chattle and forced to order immediately.

Obviously we had to have three buffets adultos. Accompanied by two bottles of domestic beer and a half bottle of Concha y Toro wine our total was $370.00 We were granted admission to the hedonistic highway and we were hungry. We found a solid salad bar featuring Bacos (natch) and The Best Cottage Cheese in Mexico. Vegetables were crisp and fresh. Dilly dressing and super tasty beets. Well played, Sir.

Because I am selective I managed to consume nothing too disgusting, which is a feat for this kind of dining experience. The Cream of Broccoli soup was actually quite good. The garlic bread tasted like vanilla cake and was therefore not enjoyable. I went back for another helping of peas and cottage cheese and felt like the queen of restraint. I didn't get grossly full and everything I had was a remarkable approximation of food.

Malcolm's approach is slightly more aggressive. He plunders a buffet like a drunken pirate on a hot Tortola night. And every so often, he succeeds. Mostly, however, he digs in to every soupy wet, meaty weird portion and comes out the other side pinker and sweaty as the pork you should pass up. Based on his postprandial status, I would say to steer clear of chicken wings, pot roast, macaroni and cheese, hush puppies, Mexican beef in sauce, brownies and California rolls.

The dessert bar looked good, with standard American fare such as Jello prominently on display. There was the strictly necessary soft serve machine with seasonally appropriate toppings, e.g, candy corn. It was, in short, the total nostalgic experience. Is it odd that it happened in Mexico? Not really. As we flock south to escape such things, they are embraced here. On Friday we welcome the Starbucks. Stay tuned!

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