Gut Instinct: Meat Your Match
Every so often, my friend José likes to remind me of his brief flirtation with bulimia. He was dining at Midtowns Churrascaria Plataforma, a Brazilian meat circus where customers can chomp unlimited medium-rare barnyard animals.
It was so good, he says, eyes glazed with flesh remembered, hands caressing belly. But I was full. And there were still meats to sample.
A normal man would cry no más. But José brims with machismo, stubbornness and, most crucially, a thrifty streak. José wanted his moneys worth. So he excused himself, wandered to the bathroom and, like a teen suffering self-image issues, calmly turned his stomach inside out.
Then I sat down and ate until I was full again, he says happily. I had two dinners.
José tells this tale not with shame but pride at his simple solution. Im hungry. How can I eat more? I can vomit. No matter how often Ive heard this storyand lord, I can by now taste Josés bileIm still mortified. Go on, call me a hypocrite: One recent belly-roiling weekday, I chopsticked up 20 boiled pork-and-leek dumplings at Zhengs, then nipped numerous bourbons at Brooklyn whiskey lair Char No. 4.
The crucial distinction is that a deep chasm separates the hedonistic giddiness of devouring your favorite food and upchucking to eat seconds. Think of all the starving Ethiopian children! His wanton hunger was tricky to fathomuntil I received an invitation to test my eating off switch.
Come dine at Porcão Churrascaria [360 Park Ave. South at 26th St., 212-252-7080], the invite said. Two dozen meats, served tableside rodizio-style. A salad bar. All-you-can-eat for $50.
Not in a million years, said my girlfriend, a staunch vegetarian.
Theres salad. You love lettuce. Ill eat enough cow for both of us. Mmm double dose of bovine. She looked aghast, as if I said was considering becoming a transvestite hooker. Scratch that. I went to Plan B: Julie B. Licorice-skinny Julie has the appetite of a female Michael Phelps and a chain-smoking teens metabolism. She regularly devours greasy cheeseburgers and a dozen chicken wings, still keeping a single-digit dress size.
I like to eat, she explains, as if unabashed love of gooey nachos and bacon magically allow her to retain her girlish figure.
Its time for the tummy test, I say as we arrive at Porcãos cavernous dining room, New York cool as interpreted by a neon- and leather-loving Don Johnson. But tonights sole vice is unrepentant carnivorism. A cordial, clean-faced waiter introduces himself. And this is your
Surrogate girlfriend, I say. Mine wont come within a hundred feet of a steakhouse. The waiter smiles, his face frozen in friendly rictus, and passes us several plastic discs. When hungry, he explains, flip the disc to green; when full, flip it to red.
Is it go time? I ask Julie.
Im wearing elastic, Julie says, turning our discs shamrock.
As quickly as unleashed caged tigers, a procession of servers spring forward. Each cradles a throat-slitting knife and spitted meat. Skirt steak, rib-eye and flank are carved into silky-thin slices, which I grab with mini tongs evidently fashioned for munchkins. Tender beer-marinated chicken breasts give way to gnaw-worthy beef ribs.
Is churrascaria Spanish for heart attack? I ask Julie, chewing provolone-topped prime rib.
My elastic needs to stretch further, she replies, stabbing soft, pecorino-coated pork loin.
Gluttony comes quickly and tastily. Filet mignon wrapped in bacon, says one server, like hes selling an illicit drug. I take two slices, savoring the juicy, fatty animal-on-animal heresyIm too stingy to become a smoker again, but I could become addicted to this flavorful cattle-pig Frankenstein.
To further muddle our senses, a bartender wheels around a drinks cart to muddle caipirinhas. Hes like a drunken dim-sum lady, I whisper to Julie. I sip my third blend of passion fruit and cachaça, fermented sugarcane juice that, on its own, recalls first-aid antiseptic. The caipirinha is fruity. It is refreshing. It is, after all that medium-rare animal, much too much.
Churrascariaslike unlimited buffets and sushi densoffer overdoses of pleasure. Whats great in moderation is not exponentially better by the wheelbarrow. Despite a lifetime of beer commercials pleading us to know when to say when, we still dont. Open bars are guaranteed to end in slurring shambles, just like a churrascaria visit inevitably concludes with hands clutching distended stomach, cursing cows for being born so delicious.
More filet mignon? a server asks, his knife poised on the burnished, bacon-wrapped exterior.
Nuhhhhhhhhh, I mumble, flipping the disc to red and waddling to my bathroom fate.