Plaidophile

When I was in Portland, terpia took me out to lunch at Benihana. For those who don't know, it's a "theme" restaurant chain which is an attempt at simulating a Japanese hibachi restaurant (where the chef prepares your food right on the table, with a little culinary acrobatics). The thing about Beni Hana is that most of the chefs aren't actually Japanese (ours was named Felipe), but they squint their eyes and speak in an extremely-forced accent right out of a 1950s sitcom; I'd imagine that any actual Japanese patrons would end up leaving totally offended.

That said, the food is pretty good.

But it gave me an idea for a theme restaurant chain to start in Japan, called "Guy Gene's."

First of all, they'd greet patrons by saying "Oh-hey-oh!" and when they left they'd say "Are-eye-gate-oh!" But that would be the closest they get to speaking Japanese — for they'd insist (in a heavy pseudo-Texan drawl) that all patrons speak and order in English.

The food itself would be hamburgers and barbeque and so on (prepared on a flaming vented charcoal grill at the table, of course). The only vegetables on the menu would be corn on the cob, black-eyed peas, and (arguably a vegetable) Freedom Fries. Instead of culinary acrobatics, there'd be "accidental" pyrotechnics with lighter fluid, followed up with bad jokes like "Wow-ee! I haven't seen anything like that since Pearl Harbor!"

I think it would do well.