Suspect breakfast system

So, I actually wake up at a reasonable time, and mosey down to get my ‘’FULL HOT BREAKFAST’’, as it says on the voucher. I walk up to the reception desk, and the Very Busy Lady who’s bustling about, picking up used dishes and bringing them back to the kitchen, says (gesturing) ‘’Take a seat at any one of these tables.’’ So I do.

After a few minutes of watching her continue to bustle, and realizing that there’s no other dining room staff, I leave my coat at the table and intercept her bustling to ask, ‘’Umm -- should I just help myself?’’ (pointing at the buffet-style table; I figured maybe if you have a voucher, they actually take your order). She confirms this; more bustling. (Hm! Maybe she’d have to take less trips if she used a tray or a cart and cleared the tables all at once -- instead of taking only a handful at a time -- sometimes making two or three trips to clear just one table.) So, I mosey over to the buffet tables.

There’s a table with do-it-yourself toast (i.e. sliced bread; and a toaster), plus minor pastries. There’s another table with four types of juice, in glass pitchers; a glass jug o’ milk; cubed melons; plus some misc. cold things. And, near that is a countertop with several types of cold cereal, and another jug o’ milk (whole milk this time, rather than low-fat). I take one of the pastries and get some cereal, and bring it to my table. Then I go back for a glass of milk (for pouring onto the cereal), and a glass of mystery juice (no labels, but it wasn’t the apple juice or the orange juice).

I’m about to sit down and start eating, when I realize that even though my work is paying for this, the voucher did say I’m supposed to get a hot breakfast. So I catch up with the Very Busy Lady again, and ask about the ‘’hot breakfast’’ angle. She points out a table that’s further in to the restaurant; behind a row of potted plants along a waist-high room divider; and partially blocked from view by a pillar. Hm! Part of a plot to keep people away from the hot food? Or just poor planning? I mosey over.

Three steam trays on stands, each with two compartments. Kidney beans (an Aussie/New England thing?) and breakfast sausages in the first; bacon and plain scrambled eggs (no bits o’ onion...) in the second; and flat triangle-ish hash browns plus grilled tomato (an Aussie breakfast thing) in the third. I took a slice of bacon, a scoop of scrambled eggs, and a hash brown shape.

Bacon was fine; not too greasy. Scrambled eggs were damp (steamer?) and plain, so I sprinkled Tobasco sauce on it; hash brown was lacking, but couldn’t identify why.

LATTER ADDENDUM: By lunch time was starving. Funny, since that’s more than I usually have for B-fast.


--GG