A FOODIE who filled up her plate at the world’s biggest buffet for just £10 has spilled the beans on her tasty experience.
Serving up giant steaks, extra thick milkshakes and Amish pie, the huge restaurant serves up enough grub for 10,000 people every single day.
Shady Maple Smorgasbord has transformed East Earl, Pennsylvania into an unlikely tourist hotspot in recent years.
Hungry Americans and fascinated tourists regularly flock to the 100,000 sq ft buffet to try and take on the world’s biggest buffet.
In recent years it has even become famous on social media through food bloggers and popular influencers.
One of these is New York-based influencer Amorray Marcano who visited Shady Maple back in April.
In an interview with The Sun, she mentioned that being a content creator allows her to showcase interesting places in and around New York. To her surprise, she discovered the largest buffet in America near her.
“So I wanted to go just because of its reputation of being the largest and serving up to 10,000 people in a day.”
Amorray, 29, filmed her trip and posted it online to her 440,000 Instagram followers.
She said one of her biggest concerns going into the buffet was the quality of the food.
Many individuals visit buffets as a fun dining adventure, piling their plates with a variety of dishes to sample as much as possible.
But the food is typically seen as below par due to it usually being left out under a heat lamp for some time before being eaten.
Shady Maple is far from an average all you can eat place though as it even boasts an impressive 4.6 star rating online.
Amorray said she was “pleasantly surprised” by the taste of the food on offer.
She admitted: “There were hits and misses, but there were certain things that were actually really good.
“The night I went they were serving catfish. And I don’t really eat catfish normally, but thought I’ll try it and it was so good.
“It was cooked really well and just delicious.
Reflecting on her experience, she noted some aspects that she didn’t particularly enjoy. She commented on certain dishes being a bit dry or lacking seasoning.
“But the things that were good were great, like their beef brisket, the steak and of course the cajun catfish.”
The whole buffet is open Monday to Saturday and welcomes in hungry guests from 7am all the way through to 7:30pm.
During the day, they serve up a breakfast, lunch and dinner offerings.
The breakfast costs just $13.99 (£10) during the week and lunch will set you back $19.99 (£15).
The price for dinner varies depending on exactly what type of food you want to treat yourself to but a standard price is $26.99 (£20).
This encompasses grill items, 46 salad bar items, three soups, six homemade breads & rolls, four cheeses, eight different meats, 14 vegetables, ten cold desserts, three hot desserts, eight pies, six cakes, sundae bar and countless drinks.
Special options are also available throughout the week including steak night, seafood night, wings night or even the grand menu.
There were hits and misses, but there were certain things that were actually really good
Amorray Marcano
Amorray was amazed by the cheap price of the unlimited food.
She continued: “I would see people sit down, they would eat, and then they would go back for more and you could stay for as long as you want.
“So realistically, you could stay there for hours so it’s a great bang for your buck.
“For the night that I went, it was like $27 and the amount of food you get for that is easily worth way more than the price.”
One thing that did leave a sour taste in Amorray’s mouth was just how busy the buffet was.
Amorray and her friend queued up for 30 minutes outside at around dinner time due to the long line of excited guests.
The influencer was mainly shocked by this due to its little known location.
Not only is East Earl a tight knit community in Amish country but it also has a population of under 2,000 people.
You could stay there for hours so it’s a great bang for your buck
Amorray Marcano
This means the town can sometimes be packed out with over five times the number of residents due to the popularity of the restaurant.
“When I went in, I thought there’s not going to be that much seating. But then once I walked in, there was loads in every, nook and cranny,” Amorray added.
“There must have been thousands of people in there and I was not expecting that just because we already had a 30 minute wait and there was a huge line behind us.
“Honestly I was kind of overwhelmed when I went in because I was expecting the amount of food but not the amount of people.”
But after tucking into her first plate, Amorray said she fully understood why so many people flocked to the world famous Pennsylvania buffet.
Amorray was also blown away by the number of drinks available.
I tried one of the world’s most expensive buffets – and made my money back in just one plate
By The Sun’s Assistant Travel Editor, Sophie Swietochowski
AS the Sun travel desk’s resident foodie, I could hardly resist trying the UK’s fanciest buffet, also one of the world’s most expensive.
The Grove Hotel in Hertfordshire went viral earlier last year when TikTok foodies discovered its Glasshouse restaurant where everyone dines en masse, but in five-star luxury.
Costing a whopping £82 per person at the weekend, there is certainly enough to choose from.
After several, overly-generous spoonfuls of caviar, a few servings of beetroot-cured salmon and seven superbly crafted sushi rolls, decorated with dainty herbs, I felt I’d made a good dent in “getting my money’s worth” – a statement that had been thrown back and forth between my buffet partner, Mum, and I.
I prowled the platters of sizzling Asian grub arranged temptingly in tandoor bowls and loaded into terracotta dishes, before heading straight for the crispy Thai fish cakes.
The fish section was part of one of 10 dining areas at the buffet.
This includes a carving station, AKA the place to pick up your classic roast dinner and trimmings with slices of rare roast beef, flakey wellington and crispy roast spuds all laid out with gravy.
There was a sushi station with hand-made California rolls placed delicately alongside huge tubs of wasabi and seaweed salads.
The robata grill is where everything from whole seabass to juicy steaks are scorched over an open flame and there’s also fresh pasta and pizza stations.
If all this isn’t enough to wrap your head around, you can also order directly from the chefs, doting on each station, when there is something in particular that you fancy that isn’t on display.
So the real question is: would you pay that much cash for dinner?
Much like the food on offer at the buffet, Shady Maple provided almost every kind of soft drink imaginable.
The star of the drinks show was a huge soda fountain to the side of the room.
This had all kinds of soda in it from cream soda, vanilla coke and even root beer as well as all the regular options.
A coffee machine, hot chocolate station and milkshake stand meant everyone’s taste was catered for.
Alcohol was the only notable exception on the menu.
And no tipping is expected at the restaurant.
Amorarry recommended anyone in the area to head to Shady Maple if they get the chance.
