Gluttony is a dubious virtue

One of the food-bearing watering holes in my neighborhood has opted to use their plastic-slotted-letter sidewalk sign to advertise one of their new food specials:
"One-pound Monster cheeseburger with fries $8.95."

One-pound burger. One pound of ground beef is what we order at the supermarket to make burgers for our whole family---me, my wife, my daughter, and a mini-burger for the dog---and even between that gang, the dog winds up with more than just her mini-burger. One pound of ground beef is what you’d get if you ordered a McDonald’s Quarter Pounder and told the cashier, "And add three more patty slabs."

My question is simple: Why? One pound of ground beef on a bun is literally larger than your stomach. Our hunger responds 15 minutes later than our appetite, and since it likely takes longer than 15 minutes to eat a one-pound burger with fries (it would take me the better part of an afternoon) the last bites of that burger strike me as more the completion of a dare than the final satisfaction of a growling belly. My friend Steven was extolling the virtues of one of Portland’s favored chicken-fried steak purveyors, and his description of his favorite included its reasonable size; when talk turned to other restaurants who serve oversize portions of the same item, he said, "I don’t want my meal to be a challenge." In such a challenge, reaching the finish line is hardly a victory.

I suspect this is meant as an enticement in a down economy, a huge meal at a somewhat affordable price, but it’s also the residue of the old "more is better" mindset, the misunderstanding that if plenty is satisfying, more than plenty must be more satisfying. It’s the mentality of the 64 ounce Big Gulp and all-you-can-eat pasta joints ---these things create the illusion that we need to consume as much as possible in order to maximize the "value" of the investment. But it seems to me that the best way to get value is to start by making better investments.