So Saturday night rolls around, and Mom and I need a place to eat for dinner. When we first moved to Pensacola and were in search of good restaurants, Erika suggested Kirin, a very good and popular Chinese/Japanese restaurant near the Cordova Mall. After the disappointment of the China Express in Baton Rouge during our trip cross-country, Mom said the next time she would go for Chinese would be at the Rickshaw Inn in our old hometown of Riverside, Rhode Island. That wasn't going to happen for a long time, and I convinced Mom to go to Kirin for dinner on Saturday night.

Mom and I got an early start that night in order to be home in time for the Red Sox/Rangers game on MLB Extra Innings and to get some clothing and supplies from our unoccupied new home. We pulled into the parking lot just before 5 p.m., and the lot was filling up with the cars of other early diners wanting to beat the later crowds. The entrance to the restaurant was decorated with the familiar male and female Chinese lions that decorate many Chinatowns around the world, and Mom and I were seated in a booth at the window immediately by the nice hostess. Unfortunately, we were seated next to a girl and her boyfriend, and she seemed to have total control of the conversation and wouldn't shut up through the whole meal, and we could hear her freakin' life story from our table.

After ordering some water to drink from our waitress, Mom and I were able to hit the buffet immediately. There were about a half-dozen tables bursting with many Chinese delicacies. "Oh where to start?", I thought to myself. Finally, I hit the appetizer table first and piled my plate with small portions of skewered chicken, crab rangoons, an eggroll, fried shrimp, stir-fried asparagus, and stuffed mushrooms and a little Chinese hot mustard for dipping. All of the appetizers were great, but I enjoyed the stuffed mushrooms and crab rangoons the best, and the asparagus was in a light soy sauce and was crisp and bright green.

After eating my appetizers, I was was ready for Round 2 and hit the main courses. I took small portions of lo mein, chicken and broccoli, my favorite General Tso's Chicken, more asparagus and skewered chicken. Mom got a second plate of fruit, fried rice, and other main courses. The General's Chicken was some of the best I have had in a while with a hint of orange flavor and not overpowered with ginger. Oh yeah! I forgot about the sushi bar at Kirin. I grabbed a few morsels of goodness from the extensive Sushi bar on the way back to the table, and some of the pieces looked like works of art you'd rather admire than eat!

Mom stopped after the second trip to the buffet declaring she was full, but I wasn't done and was eyeballing the fruit and dessert table. Except for the General's Chicken and some of the appetizers, I was being pretty good with eating small portions of foods with veggies or fruit and not gorging myself like many others do when they go to a buffet. For dessert, I got a couple of chunks of honeydew melon, canteloupe, and watermelon along with some bananas in raspberry sauce. I was a bad girl though and got a couple of melt in your mouth Chinese cookies and a little piece of custard cake, but hey!, it was Saturday, and it's OK to pig out on the weekends.

By the time I forced the last bite of cookie into my mouth, I was really stuffed. Stuffed like some of the Super Bowl feasts we used to have when we lived in Rhode Island Stuffed. I thought the waitress would have to run to the Home Depot across the road for a flat cart to haul me to the car, but Mom and I managed to waddle our way to the car and up the 16 steps leading to our condo (had to burn off the calories somewhere!).