EATS OF EDEN : Bounty Hunters Feast Their Eyes, Etc., on the Heavenly Spreads of the Buffet Line

Consider the buffet, from humble steam table to grand hotel feast. Why is it we run wild at the very sight of one, as soon as we pick up a plate?

My first memorable buffet happened while I was an exchange student in 1970. In that year, I visited Stockholm’s Operakalleren, home to the most lavish smorgasbord in Europe. Inside, amid the luxurious decor, I glimpsed the royally laden tables, then panic set in. No one had told me where to begin.

A kindly maitre d’ saved the day. He saw my problem and stepped in, explaining the smorgasbord’s proper etiquette. “First eat the iced dishes and smoked fish,” he said, “then eat the cold dishes, composed salads and jellied meats.” I took his advice, gratefully, working my way up to hot dishes such as dilled potatoes, Swedish meatballs, reindeer steak and beef with onions. The food was incredible, and I relished it, right up to the moment the bill arrived and I discovered I had blown two weeks’ worth of expense money.

Since then, I’ve had deck buffets aboard ships, breakfast buffets in Las Vegas and, this year, a terrific barbecue buffet at Maurice Bessinger’s in Charleston, S.C., where unlimited platefuls of breaded catfish, Southern fried chicken and mustard-colored pork come to less than $6.

These days, I’m careful to do any buffet in several stages, combining dishes scientifically, so the foods don’t clash. Unfortunately, er, I still eat too much.

What follows is only a small sampling of the buffets in our area, but I hope it’s a good cross-section. Many types of restaurants, from Sizzler on up, have salad bars so complete they are effectively buffets themselves. In addition, upscale supermarkets such as Vons Pavilions and Irvine Ranch have special salad areas where customers can choose items and pay by the pound, making it easy to eat buffet-style at home. So enjoy, and remember to eat slowly. You can always go back for more.

The Terrace Buffet at the Ritz-Carlton

The mother of all Orange County brunches is this outrageous, almost otherworldly buffet, which carries with it an astronomical price tag. Anyone looking for that big blowout or a truly celebratory experience should find this grand Sunday feast satisfies all requirements.

Where outside Stockholm would you find a smoked fish and caviar bord like this one? There are three kinds of caviar, home-cured salmon, smoked mahi-mahi, trout and assorted fixings; cream cheese, chopped egg, capers, onions, blini, sour cream and a half dozen varieties of mini-bagels. That, by the way, is only a corner of this buffet.

On a sunny day, foods are layed out by the downstairs pool, and the tables appear to stretch almost endlessly. One table has fresh oysters and iced prawns, another Caesar salad tossed to order by a chef. How about an omelet man to cater to your every conceivable whim? You want roast meats, they’ve got ‘em, hand-carved and plated with spicy, exotic chutneys. Try leg of lamb with the unctuous mango chutney, or garlic-and-herb-studded tenderloin of beef topped with a rich mushroom reduction.

Breakfast meats and hot dishes are next: perfect eggs Benedict with a textbook Hollandaise and runny center yolk, spicy Italian sausage, braised chicken with shredded cabbage, tiny waffles accompanied by jars of real maple syrup. And don’t forget the dessert buffet, overflowing with impossibly rich French pastries, tiramisu, rum babas and sauces.

The hotel has a wine list loaded with an international selection of fine vintage wines, not to mention service that is snappy and professional. The buffet’s clientele is well-heeled, but that doesn’t stop a casual crowd from infiltrating. For those who want a taste but can’t rationalize this much luxury, an abbreviated, more moderately priced buffet ($25) is served in the hotel’s Lobby Lounge.

Ritz-Carlton Hotel, 33533 Ritz-Carlton Drive, Dana Point. (714) 240-5008. Buffet Sunday only, 10:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Adults, $38.50; children under 12, $19.25. All major cards accepted.

Country Harvest Buffet

Meanwhile, at the other end of the pricing spectrum, there is Country Harvest Buffet, a growing new chain with three Orange County locations. The Costa Mesa store is bright, cheerful and almost always filled with families and seniors. It’s safe to say there isn’t much overlap between the crowd you bump into here and the one nibbling on caviar and oysters in Dana Point. Except, maybe, for the way both groups pile up their plates.

But there is no shortage of conviviality, from the cheerful hostesses who show you to your narrow, Formica-topped table, to the managers in white shirts (who minister to the food stations by remote microphone, making sure items are replenished when they run low).

And most of the people eating here seem quite happy. Because when it comes to bang for the buck, Country Harvest Buffet has to be called a bargain. Are there actually good things to eat here? Well, a few. Mostly, though, it is glorified cafeteria fare.

Here’s how it works. You stand in a line, sometimes a long one, to pay. Inside, you are free to hit the various food islands as often as you like. Anyone who has been to a casino buffet in Vegas should be familiar with this format. One island has cold salads such as ambrosia, corn salad and cole slaw; another has hot dishes, another is sumptuously laden with desserts.

Featured dishes change according to the day of the week: Fridays, for instance, it’s Maryland crab cakes, clam chowder and fried shrimp; Saturdays, roast pork loin with apple prune dressing and barbecued beef ribs, among other things.

Most foods taste mass-produced, but there are exceptions. Pull a piece of corn bread from the center of the pan, and it will be fluffy and delicious, a fine complement for the house roast chicken, another good bet. The pork loin and apple prune dressing cannot be faulted, nor can roasted potatoes, blueberry muffins and roast beef. Avoid anything fried and especially anything posing as Italian.

For dessert, try chocolate fudge pudding cake, or better yet, the perfectly decent apple crisp. If you leave here hungry, you are even pickier than I.

Country Harvest Buffet has three O.C. locations: 1630 W. Katella Ave., Anaheim, (714) 539-2234; 2300 Harbor Blvd., Costa Mesa, (714) 631-2235; 1008 E. 17th St., Santa Ana, (714) 541- 3020. Breakfast Saturday and Sunday, 8 to 11 a.m.; lunch Monday through Friday, 10:45 a.m. to 2:45 p.m., and Saturday, 11:30 a.m. to 2:45 p.m.; dinner Monday through Saturday, 3 to 9 p.m., and Sunday, 11:30 a.m. to 9 p.m. Breakfast is $5.49 ($4.99 for seniors); lunch, $5.39 ($4.89 for seniors); dinner, $6.89 ($6.05 for seniors). MasterCard and Visa accepted.

New Seoul B.B.Q. Buffet

Korean cuisine is a natural for the buffet format, and this spotlessly clean Korean barbecue house has the most appealing format I’ve yet seen in an Asian restaurant. It’s a quantum leap forward from the typically gruesome Chinese steam table buffet, where almost everything is fried in cornstarch or drenched in dark soy sauce. Furthermore, you get to do the cooking yourself.

The smiling waitresses take drink orders, turn on your individual charcoal braziers and bring you hot bean soup alongside a mound of steaming white rice. You then hit the buffet line, piling your plate with uncooked Korean meats and seafoods-- kalbi (short ribs), bulgogi (marinated beef), shrimp, eel, mussels, squid--and vegetables like scallions, spinach, bean sprouts, pickled garlic and green salad. Plus fresh orange slices to refresh the palate.

Then you head to your table and place items in the middle of the brazier, cooking them up to your heart’s desire. (Oh, but don’t cook the chap chae , slippery cold noodles with sesame dressing. It’s a side dish.) The quality and hygiene is top-notch, and it’s all good fun.

Being that this is a Korean cuisine, expect that many of the proteins (especially spicy pork and the squid) will have been given an intense bath in garlic and chili. You will also find several of the cuisine’s notoriously odoriferous kimchi (vegetables pickled with dried shrimp, hot pepper and garlic) on the restaurant’s extensive condiment line, ones fashioned from cabbage, radish and more. Eat them with abandon, but be warned that the fruit-flavored gum you get at the cash register on your way out will not go a long way toward erasing the evidence.

New Seoul B.B.Q. Buffet, 9902 Garden Grove Blvd., Garden Grove. (714) 537-9902. Lunch Monday through Friday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.; dinner Monday through Friday, 3 to 10:30 p.m., and Saturday and Sunday, 11 a.m. to 10:30 p.m. Lunch, $6.50; dinner, $10.95. MasterCard and Visa accepted.

Marmac’s

This is a dark, clubby restaurant with real brick walls, semicircular black booths and softly tinkling cocktail piano music; in short, the sort of ambience popularized by Velvet Turtle during the ‘70s.

From the restaurant’s fortress-like exterior, it is the last place you’d ever expect to find a toqued chef ladling out brown gravy. But that’s what awaits you (unless you decide to order a la carte from the menu, which is predominantly steak and seafood).

What makes Marmac’s special is the hand-carved prime rib--a good one--included in this buffet. A carving chef will cleave a thick pink slab, oozing juices, off a huge standing rib roast. You get to enjoy it with good trimmings, too: terrific, yeasty rolls, spinach salad with a fine hot bacon dressing, even whole baked potatoes, steaming in their foil wrappers.

Pass on most of the filler, though. The tired-looking salad bar, for instance, is composed of things like cold pastas and runny cole slaw, while three or four dishes like dry roast chicken or starchy, overly creamy fettuccine with seafood make up the hot section. For what it is worth, Marmac’s changes these dishes daily, though the prime rib is available every day.

Desserts are equally uninspiring, save one. Amid the sheet cakes and milk powder puddings, you’ll find a small freezer stocked with Carnation vanilla ice cream. Scoop yourself some, then top it with Hershey’s chocolate syrup and multicolored sprinkles. At these prices, you’ll swear you’ve walked into your own party.

Marmac’s, 12777 Knott St., Garden Grove. (714) 898-5645. Lunch Monday through Saturday, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., and Sunday, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.; dinner Monday through Saturday, 4 to 10 p.m., and Sunday, 3:30 to 10 p.m. Lunch buffet is $5.95. Dinner buffet: Monday through Wednesday, $6.95 (without prime rib) or $12.95 (with); Thursday through Sunday, $9.95 (without prime rib) or $12.95 (with). American Express, MasterCard and Visa accepted.

The Clay Oven

The lunch buffet has long been a standard in Indian restaurants, partly to bolster business for the evening trade, and partly because these curries and stewed vegetable dishes are well suited to the steam table.

Praveen Bansal’s Clay Oven is one of the most pleasant of the county’s Indian restaurants, giving excellent value for the dollar. It’s a cheerful, elegant little room stuck in the middle of an Irvine mini-mall, uncharacteristically (for an Indian restaurant) doubling as a showcase gallery for local artists. During lunch, the restaurant is well lit, and the management plays soft ragas over a sound system. No wonder so many patrons linger well past the lunch hour.

You’ll find the usual suspects on this buffet line, but they are done with atypical lightness and flavor. There is always chicken from the tandoor--the restaurant’s eponymous clay oven--at least one green vegetable dish and mounds of fluffy basmati rice. The day I sampled the buffet, there were stewed yellow lentils, curried chicken, spinach with potato, a refreshing yogurt dip called raita , several kinds of fresh cut vegetables, hot flat bread from the oven and a creamy, almond-rich rice pudding for dessert.

Sundays, when the Indian clientele comes out in force, the buffet includes fruits and an expanded vegetarian section. The good news is that the price remains the same all week.

The Clay Oven, 15435 Jeffrey Road, Irvine. (714) 552-2851. Lunch buffet served daily, 11:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. $6.50. American Express, MasterCard and Visa accepted.

Souplantation

In my view, this is the best of the chains doing soup, salad and pasta buffets. You don’t get as much protein for your dollar as you do at a Country Harvest Buffet, but according to nutritionists, you don’t really need that much. Furthermore, any time I’ve eaten in a Souplantation, the food has been fresh and high quality.

In October, hot pastas were added to the already bountiful format, which has always included a variety of cold pastas such as shrimp tarragon with a rich mayonnaise-based dressing. Sauces and pasta shapes change weekly; the last time I visited I found a hearty salsa Bolognese as well as marinara and a creamy primavera Alfredo, all waiting to douse my radiatore and linguine.

The long salad bar is the base of operations for many people who come here, and it invariably has several types of greens, 10 dressings, 11 “fresh cuts” or fresh vegetables, eight prepared salads such as the pastas, herbed barley salad and carrot-raisin salad, plus prepared salads, which could be sesame-flavored won-ton chicken or Caesar. At the soup station, chili, chicken noodle and clam chowder are the standbys, available every day. A vegetarian soup such as black bean or minestrone is always available, too, plus a wild card soup that might be anything: cream of broccoli, Irish potato leek . . . you get the idea.

Add to this great blueberry muffins, two kinds of Italian focaccia, fruits, puddings, yogurts, soft-serve ice cream, several fat-free choices and at dinner only, a baked potato bar, and you’ve got something for everyone.

Souplantation, 111179 Talbert Ave., Fountain Valley, (714) 434-1814. (Additional O.C. franchises are in Brea, Costa Mesa, Garden Grove, Laguna Niguel and Tustin.) Open Sunday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m., Friday and Saturday till 10 p.m. Lunch, $5.99; dinner (from 4 p.m.), $7.19. Children under 12, $3.99 any time. MasterCard and Visa accepted.