Those areas boast names such as “Stir Crazy” (a nod to the stir-fry menu) and “Center Cut” (devoted to meaty specialties and a carving station). The brightly lit buffet area currently seats 299, with a mix of tables and booths that surround the food stations. (By the way, the resort still has more expansions on the horizon, including its slated opening of a 205-room hotel in mid-July.) The buffet has been an immediate success with the casino crowd, bolstered by a $10 promotion in April that pulled in more than 45,000 customers.

That’s certainly the case with the Farmers Market Buffet, which premiered alongside the February opening of the del Lago Resort and Casino in Waterloo.

While Vegas still has other gimmicks to grab patrons, notably the super-cheap shrimp cocktails with “jumbo” shrimp the size of teensy sea horses found in old comic-book coupon hustles, most of the casino buffets along the Eastern Seaboard deliver the gustatory goods big time and at a reasonable price.

Del lago casino buffet