Good news everyone, Fat Girl is back in Korea. And I’m finally ready to tell you about my fabulously fun trip to America – the land of supersize it, all you can eat buffets, and 300lb people. It was a fat girls dream. Now this wasn’t my first trip to the good old USA, I had been years ago when I was a kid and mainly what I remembered was the food, it was all a chubby teenage me was interested in.
Now it didn’t take us long to figure out that the portions in the USA are huge!! Even I was shocked and I pretty much have no problem finishing off 8 slices of a family sized pizza on a Sunday afternoon followed by half a cheesecake!!! Our first stop was The Pikey Bar in LA where we has some pretty amazing triple cooked chips and aioli. We also had our first celeb spotting in the form of Ryan from The O.C. who was sat at the next table. Although I did always prefer Seth, it was still quite exciting nonetheless.
While in LA I knew I had to hit up The Farmers Market. It was filled to the brim with deliciousness and stalls selling their wares. But I had no idea there would be so many restaurants there selling food for right now. Everywhere I looked there was something even more delicious to behold. We had already eaten quite the spread at our hotel that morning and had reservations for lunch in a few hours so as sad as I am to say this I couldn’t partake in the deliciousness. Except for some amazing cherries and a really nice smoothie that we got. Next time I plan to go hungry. In one of the stores they even had English chocolate!!! Cadbury’s, Malteasers and a white Chocolate Orange. Now I love Malteasers more than The Fat Boyfriend, but even I just couldn’t bring myself to pay over $5 a for a small bag, so I sadly left them on the shelf.
I had booked us a lunch at The IVY where apparently all the stars go to push their salads around their plates and get their pictures taken by the paparazzi. I’ve always liked to think of myself as a star so I fit right in. Since it was my birthday we were each given a glass of complimentary champagne (which I have always considered a great way to start a meal.) It was quickly followed up by a raspberry mojito. I decided to be a little healthy and have a cobb salad, although with all the bacon, egg, and cheese in it I’m not sure it was so healthy after all. It was also gigantic. I couldn’t even finish it. The Fat Boyfriend ordered the burger and truffle fries which was amazing. I ended up eating half so no wonder I didn’t have room for salad. I decided to skip dessert and get their special cocktail of the day, a champagne sangria, which was very good but at $25 a pop I would have been not too impressed if it wasn’t.
For dinner I decided to neglect some of the restaurants famed for their food in favour of Sur. Now if you read my blog regularly you will know how much I love trashy reality TV easpecially “The real Housewives of” series, I watch them all, every last one even Vancouver. Anyway Sur is owned by Lisa Vanderpump the star of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. It is also the set for her spin-off show Vanderpump Rules about all her gorgeous and incestuous waiters and waitresses who all callously cheat on each other behind their backs. The Fat Boyfriend absolutely loathes the show, but I think it’s fabulous. The food was fine but really nothing special, but the drinks were amazing and we saw quite a few of the cast including head lethareo Jaxx, Tom and Peter. Tom even made me a pomegranate cocktail and it was delicious.
The next day we had lunch at Santa Monica pier where I ate a large amount of edamame beans. For dinner we were pretty knackered and just grabbed an In n Out Burger on the way back to our hotel. I have been hearing nothing but good things about In n Out Burger for some time so I really couldn’t wait to try it but I was rather disappointed. The burger was okay but really nothing special and the fries were completely tasteless. I think I made a mistake by not getting them animal style. The next morning I awoke to stabbing pains which quickly developed into a severe case of food poisoning. I can’t believe after never having it in my life, travelling extensively through Asia I went all the way to the states to get it. It was a pretty hard day all round but I sucked it up and got on my flight to Vegas, which is the main thing. Was it the edamame or the burger? Who could say for sure, either way I’m off both those food groups for the foreseeable future.
So my first few meals in Vegas I pretty much skipped out on, When I awoke on my birthday morning having just turned 30, all the visions I had of, a breakfast in bed, cakes galore, and all other treats, were forgotten. However through sheer hunger I rallied in time for my dinner at Gordon Ramsay’s Steak which was absolutely amazing. One of the best steaks I have ever eaten in my life. The beef wellington was also a hit. The starters, the cocktails, the dessert with a little candle it was all incredible and well worth the money. They even had a steak trolley for you to see all the different cuts of meat. I have wanted to eat at one of Gordon Ramsay’s restaurants for a long time now, so I was glad to finally get my chance, and thanks to my food poisoning I was especially svelte in my dress.
The next day I was back to full speed and figured it was about time I hit the buffet. VIPS has nothing on these buffets, everything you could think of and more was served at the one at The Palms. Chinese, Mexican, Salad bar, Italian, Mongolian, Korea and US classics galore. The surprise hit of the buffet was the galbi ribs, I ate about 12 over 2 days, the sauce was just so so good. I can’t believe that in a buffet of that caliber I went after the galbi! I still avoided the kimchi though.
On the last day I was incredibly hung over thanks to a hard night of partying after watching Britney, I settled on panda express for some good time hangover gorging. Chinese is what I miss most from living at home so I needed to hit my quota. I also found time to eat my birthday cheesecake from The Cheesecake factory. 1300 calories of chocolate, peanut butter and caramel layered cheesecake goodness. This is the only birthday cake I will accept from now on.
We also went back to the buffet for dinner, although The poor Fat Boyfriend only managed a spoon of potatoes and a slice of pizza he was so queasy. I made up for it and managed a more ample 3 plates. I of course loaded up on Reese’s goodies at the airport and treated myself to a last minute cupcake at the airport.
Well after all that I expected to come back at least 10lbs heavier as is my usual, but would you believe it I only gained half a pound! Was it due to the food poisoning, too many salads, the liquid diet, or all that walking? Who could say for sure but I was very surprised this morning indeed, but with The Fat Wedding in less than a year it’s about time I got in shape.