Japan has many delicious buffets to suit all tastes, but for donut lovers, the Mister Donut buffet is heaven.
Finding the buffet is not easy, though, as it is only offered at certain branches. In fact, when our reporter Seiji Nakazawa visited the Takadanobaba branch where we usually go for donuts, he discovered that they had stopped the service on September 26th, with no plans to reinstate it.
It had been eight years since we first reported on Mister Donut’s all-you-can-eat buffet offer, and a year since our last report, so Seiji thought it was the perfect opportunity to visit another branch to see if things had changed. Luckily, he found six participating stores in Tokyo (we’ve listed the specifics at the end of the article), so he headed to the nearest branch in Nakano.
Once inside, we saw a poster in the window announcing the buffet, with prices set at 1,900 yen (about $12.24) for adults and 800 yen for elementary school students and younger, with all-you-can-eat drinks. Eight years ago, the buffet was 1,000 yen, and 1,200 yen with all-you-can-drink. So it’s a big increase, but it’s in line with the overall economy.
Reservations were required before, but they no longer seem to be. So if you want to join the buffet, just find a seat, confirm your seat location, and then head to the display area, where you can pick up a paper plate reserved for buffet users. Choose your favorite donuts, put them on your plate, and take it to the cashier, where the staff will hand you a little “all-you-can-eat” sign to put on your table. At the end of the one-hour feast, you need to pay.
You can go back and forth between the table and the display as many times as you like, but the catch is that customers have to pay for the food they don’t finish, so you need to make sure to only take what you can finish to avoid charges for leftovers.
Our reporter Seiji Nakazawa was lucky enough to investigate the deal for us, and he felt like a kid walking into a candy store, or should we say into a donut shop, with a tempting array of sweets in front of him.
The first donuts he grabbed were the Golden Chocolate Donut, the French Angel Donut, and the Limited Edition Gopher Skin Donut. For his drink, he chose an apple juice.
Although he had tried the Pon de Diglett before, it was one of the most expensive donuts at Mister Donut, so he figured it was a good way to get the bang for your buck.
However, it wasn’t until he took a bite that he realized one thing—the Pon de Diglett was heavier than it looked. The Gopher Donut is like a cream puff, filled with cream and secured with custard in the middle, so every bite is full of cream. While delicious, it has a heavy texture and isn’t really suitable for an unlimited serving, especially when there are so many other donuts waiting in your stomach.
With so many sweets, Seiji wondered if he could have a salty snack like a hot dog to kill time, but the clerk told him that the deal was limited to drinks and donuts. So, with the cream and sugar giving him a stomachache, he had to continue on, hoping that the old-fashioned donuts and coffee would be more thirst-quenching.
Just then, he felt a voice deep in his chest pleading, “Stop eating.” As a donut lover, Seiji was surprised to find that his body would react like this, but it was true, too much of a good thing can be bad.
His love for the chain was now put to the test, and he decided to end his trip with two drinks, hoping to get his money’s worth. So, did he make his money back in the end?
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