BD's Mongolian Barbeque

I recently had the opportunity to eat lunch at a BD's Mongolian Barbeque restaurant. If you're unfamiliar with the concept, the diner puts his desired meats, vegetables, and sauces into a bowl, where they are grilled together as a stir-fry while the diner waits.

There was a wide variety of meats and seafoods available. It had been a long time since I had duck, so I loaded up my bowl exclusively with pieces of dead duck. (So much for my consideration of making it a vegetarian lunch.) There was also a good selection of vegetables; really I would have preferred more vegetables than would fit in my bowl. I chose a variety, but the largest component was bean sprouts. Finally, for the sauces, I didn't know what I was doing, so started with some black bean sauce, added some Chinese hot sauce (I think it was kung pao sauce -- a Chinese co-worker said that I added too much) and some wine as well. Then, to complete my spicing, I added some curry powder.

All-in-all, of course, it was exactly what I wanted, even if it wasn't any good! Actually, it was fine. I can say that every time I've had duck, I've been less than 100% impressed, but that wasn't the fault of the restaurant.

Still, it's not difficult to find faults with the place. A few are as follows

• They priced a meal by the bowl, and not by the weight or contents of the bowl. This differed from the previous time I ate at a Mongolian-style restaurant, which was in Edmonton. There, the priced the meal by the weight of the contents of your bowl. That system had the problem of charging the same per gram no matter what the filling was. But the "by the bowl" pricing system is an example of what I consider to be the worst thing in current American restaurant practices. Since any bowl was priced the same, I felt compelled to fill the bowl to the brim, since I would be charged the same no matter what I put in it. Plus, they offered diners a second trip for only a few dollars above the initial price. Thus, it's another example of over-sized portions and inducement to overeating.
• I guess my second complaint against the place was that it just seemed a little ungenuine. I mean, it's a modern chain restaurant with waiters who smile a little too much, and the place is following processes from some manual of proper restauranting techniques designed to get as many customers in and out as quickly as possible, taking as much of the customers' money as possible in the interim.

In short, O.K. food, especially if you like to experiment, and an atmosphere and experience not any different than any other modern restaurant chain in its genre.