Mike’s Food for Thought – Ponderosa

I hadn’t been to a Ponderosa in quite awhile. About 2 years ago, I had a couple bad dinners there. I heard they had a new buffet menu, I was hungry so I thought,”Lets give it a try”. The menu is quite varied with several cuts of steak, chicken and some seafood options such as salmon, tilapia and shrimp. Or you can have a combo of fish and steak or chicken and steak. Prices were very reasonable for what you get. Steak and the all you can eat buffet was in the $10.99 and up range. You also get a very large baked potato, which I must admit is one of the better baked potatos I’ve had.

The all you can eat buffet has a nice array of salad fixings and they have a most delicious buttered yeast roll on the buffet as well. They are so good, it’s addicting. The buffet also offered choices such as fried and baked chicken meatloaf, mashed potatoes and gravy, green beans, corn and carrots, stuffed peppers and buttered boiled red potatoes. The chicken wings were excellent. The buffet also had several soups and a taco bar. I also noticed a small pizza on the buffet. There were also things like cottage cheese and fruits, ambrosia salad, cole slaw and macaroni salad. I could not try everything as I still had steak and shrimp to eat. My steak was tender and cooked perfectly. The fried shrimp were the best I have ever had and I mean that. They were so crispy and yet juicy.

I guess the all you can eat buffet changes a bit each day. I also want to point out that the fried chicken was very good too. Nice and crispy but moist inside. The dessert bar had quite a few things such as soft ice cream, cookies, lemon pudding cake, cupcakes, bread pudding and a fruit cobbler. I didn’t think the desserts were as good as the other food but they were ok. They had something for everyone. For beverages, they offer a selection of soda, iced tea, lemonade and coffee.

I’ve actually gone back to Ponderosa 3 times since I wrote this. The steaks and seafood have been very good each time. Check out their website www.ponderosasteakhouses.com for hours of operation and dinner and lunch hours. Let me end by saying you won’t go home hungry. I should point out that Ponderosa is open for Thanksgiving and the email I got from them said the all you can eat Thanksgiving buffet is only $10.90.

Sounds like quite a deal.