Buffets are back – and I can already feel myself losing self-control

Just a glimpse of some curling cured meats and blue-cheese slime and I'll be elbowing rival diners out of the way

I recently received an invitation that made me happy for about 10 seconds until I noticed the words guaranteed to instil dread in my heart: A buffet lunch will be served." I felt a sense of outrage, too, because surely, since Covid, buffets have been consigned to the food waste bin of history.

Something weird happens to me when I am confronted with a trestle table groaning with UFOs (unidentified food offerings). Rather than being rational and deciding on a sensible food combination, I abandon all culinary common sense and behave like a contestant on Supermarket Sweep.