Meat

There's a restaurant in Santa Monica called Fogo De Chao. It serves meat. That's pretty much it. Cow, pig, chicken. In the window there's a small fire around which the flanks of various animals slowly turn, spitting and browning in the heat.

The service is simple. You have a small place mat like card, red on one side, green on the other. Green means go, red, stop. As long as you display the appropriate colour waiters bring up slabs of meat and carve off hunks, directly on to your plate.

The best bit of the whole night, however, was watching the people eating there and their reactions slowly change. First glee, as they ate with wanton abandon, then confusion, as the endless supply started to overwhelm them, and then finally pain, as they realised several pounds of flesh was now testing their digestive abilities to the limit. I quit out after 20 minutes but some people ate for about 45. I left them to their 'kill me faces' and headed back to my hotel. Full of cow and regret.