There’s an old joke: Two elderly women are at a Catskills mountain resort, and one of them says, “Boy, the food at this place is really terrible.” The other one says, “Yeah, I know. And such small portions.”
Woody Allen (in voiceover) as Alvy Singer
Opening lines of Annie Hall (1977)
if your idea of Hell is bad food in skimpy portions. you’ve come to the right place. The acronym FABAYH may sound like a Middle-Eastern death sentence but FOOD AS BIG AS YOUR HEAD is all about outsized, outrageously good food.
We’re not talking stunt food, like that 6,510-pound omelet made for The Lung Association in Canada. (What scrambled eggs have to do with emphysema is best left to science.) And we have no interest in buffets (except when we’re in front of one with a plate in our hands). Anyone can shovel in noshes bigger than your noggin at a smorgasbord.
No, FABAYH aims to spotlight eating emporiums that dish up surprisingly large servings of quality food at reasonable prices. We want to give generous chefs their place in the sun. These folks toil day after day not to win a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records but to provide its customers with a more-than-satisfying dining experience. We salute you!
However, we’re not above mentioning restaurants with some whimsically inflated offerings, like the already well-publicized Denny’s Beer Barrel Pub, which calls itself the “Home of the World’s Largest Hamburger Challenges.” Denny’s not only serves up many versions of its typical half- or one-pounders; the eatery will also happily grind up a whole herd of cattle to produce patties from 2 to 123 pounds. On a bun to match. (Our only gripe: You can’t order any of their burgers rare. So what’s the point?)
Certainly we don’t mean to denigrate those delicious and gorgeously prepared entrees that are now the trend of the finer establishments. But PUL-EEZE! One scallop drizzled with a pear-infused balsamic reduction and spritzed with fennel “spume'”? You call that a meal? And anything accompanied by “coulis” or served in a ramekin is no friend of ours. Not when our wallets and our stomachs are nearly empty. If someone else is paying, okay, and then we go out afterward to get some real grub.