Sometimes I’m sad the bubble burst.

The age of lenders pushing jumbo mortgages gave rise to eateries pushing jumbo portions — The Cheesecake Factory, as well as my personal fave, Claim Jumper. A California chain famous for its obscene portions and California Gold Rush theme, Claim Jumper opened its doors in 1977. Its website promises that “when you step inside a Claim Jumper you will discover an environment that is warm and comfortable,” which is quite true; patrons are greeted by roaring fireplaces and over-sized booths of a deep, soothing mahogany. The lighting is low, and the exposed woodwork makes you feel as though you happened upon some Teutonic hunting lodge nestled deep in a fairy-tale forest.

But the machinic din of masticating mandibles dispels all illusions of comfort and relaxation. Dining at Claim Jumper is work. The portions demand the utmost intestinal fortitude — and elasticity. Sandwiches like “The Motherlode” require that you consume pounds of ham, roast turkey, tri-tip, bread, pickles and Thousand Island dressing. The “Honey Blonde Fish and Chips” looks like half the seasonal haul of Portugal. But taking the cake is … well … the cake: the “Chocolate Motherlode” is six shortening and sugar laden layers of chocolate cake, chocolate chips and chocolate fudge nearly a foot in length.

The Chocolate Motherlode

It was always good fun to visit Claim Jumper on a Friday night and witness a porcine couple grimly eating their way through a Motherlode. The determination on their faces was almost melancholy, as though they were backhoeing all that bleached white flour into a spiritual void they knew they could never fill. You just knew they were trying to reward themselves for two-hundred hours spent working in a featureless cubicle or behind a cash register. Perhaps it was during one of those visits that I came to realize the bubble had to burst, that such lugubrious excess couldn’t last forever. At any rate, visits to Claim Jumper proved object lessons in unsustainable consumption.

Claim Jumper is still in business. But it might not be for long, if bailout after bailout augurs austerity for the hapless homeowner now bedeviled by negative equity. Perhaps the place could trade down, swapping the fool’s gold of Velveeta for oozing Cheddar, say, and in this way survive. This would, however, mean a diminished gustatory experience, to say the least.