Ah, Heart Attack Grill: How I love you.
I believe that this would be the second regular customer of the infamous restaurant chain (do two locations really constitute a chain?)
From the Globe & Mail article:
John Alleman, 52, suffered an attack while waiting at a bus stop in front of the diner last week. He was taken off life support Monday, the Las Vegas Sun reported…… Alleman came to the restaurant daily and encouraged passing tourists to try its calorie-laden offerings….“He never missed a day, even on Christmas,” …Alleman became an unofficial mascot for the restaurant, which features waitresses in nurse garb. His caricature as “patient John” graced its merchandise and menus.
(Note: As of this writing, their website still has pictures and contact info for “Patient John” under their Diet Program tab.
I visited the Heart Attack Grill’s Las Vegas location last year for a bachelor party and had a lovely time. You’re made to wear a hospital gown upon entrance. Our Nurse/Waitress was awfully lovely (apparently, a single diner from each table gets a paddling from the waitress with what looked to be a small cricket bat. According to my selected friend, they do not hold back. A little stress release for the staff, I would imagine, that might serve other tourist establishments well.)
There is a large digital scale located in the middle of the dining room floor. You are encouraged to weigh yourself before and after your meal. I’m pretty sure that besides a few children who were in attendance, I was the only guy there under 200 lbs.
Their menu is pretty simple: You can get one of their burgers (Single/Double/Triple/Quadruple Bypass varieties), french fries (Deep Fried in Pure Lard!), milkshakes, cheap booze, and cigarettes. And that’s it. Vegetarians, unless you are drinking your dinner, you’re shit out of luck.
I went with the Quadruple Burger (2lbs of beef + 20 slices of bacon. 10,000 calories), because, well: You go big or you go home. And if you finish the whole thing, they wheel you out in a wheelchair. Glory!
The damn burger was almost the size of my head. And it was the same height as the tall boy I was drinking from.
It was excessive and wrong. And delicious. If it was a quarter of the size, I probably would have loved it. Instead, I wobbled out of there (No wheelchair for me, sadly. I came a little short of polishing off the meal) pale and a little sick. And according to the restaurant scale, I gained about 6 pounds during the meal.
HOWEVER! I would very happily eat there again. I would just steer away from the Quadruple Bypass though. That was just a stupid amount of meat. It’s a fun place that revels in the excesses that society is trying to curb. And its needed.
If you eat at the Heart Attack Grill every day though? Well, it’s got Heart Attack right in the name. They’re not lying to you.
I WILL EAT YOU! 