Bristol Ikea’s all-you-can-eat Meatball Rave was just as mad as you thought

“I was not tripping. Someone had not slipped something into my fizzy lingonberry juice”

“Hello again! The usual is it, sir?” The words every Englishman longs to hear in their local pub, after they’ve been a regular there for a certain number of years. They are not the words I ever thought I’d hear from the lady behind the meatball servery at Ikea.

And yet, it was a valid question as I sauntered over for the third time to be handed a plate of delicious Ikea meatballs, with that lovely gravy, those perfectly-boiled peas and the slightly strange jam that makes it just that little bit more Swedish.

My only question, really, was am I going for mash again – my usual – or chips this time?

Behind me, things were getting about as chaotic as Ikea’s restaurant will probably ever get. Very loud music – I think the youngsters these days refer to them as ‘dancefloor bangers’ – was being played by a DJ with a pumping PA and flashing disco lights.

In front of him, in a space created where the seating goes round the corner, a giant meatball with two legs danced, surrounded by energetic small children.

I was not tripping. Someone had not slipped something into my fizzy lingonberry juice. Yes, this was the Ikea’s sold-out ‘Eatball Buffet’ event, and at 5pm on a Thursday, it was the hottest ticket in Bristol.

It was certainly the most bizarre, epic and odd thing to happen in Bristol at that time, and perhaps any time.

People – and I include myself in this – paid £5 for a ticket. Ikea closed the restaurant off to regular shoppers, set up a grand blue-carpet entrance, and the usual Ikea polo shirt-clad staff were dressed in suits and bow ties. There was a roped off VIP area, and things inside were very different.

Everyone had a wristband like it was a festival – the young children had their back of their hands stamped like they were in a nightclub, and everyone got stuck in.

Outside, as we later discovered, other people – the people who I can only imagine were kicking themselves they missed out on this – were shuffling around the actual Ikea doing boring things like looking at light shades and 31 different kinds of square cabinets.

In the restaurant, the DJ whacked on Gala’s Freed From Desire, and people tentatively carrying trays of meatball meals passed the giant meatball whooped.

The deal was a simple one. Ikea family member holders paid £5 for a ticket and that meant for three hours you could go up and get a meatball meal and a drink – the refill soft drinks or tea or coffee – however many times you want.

I’m someone who constantly has to remind themselves that an ‘all-you-can-eat’ scenario is an invitation not a challenge, but this was too good an opportunity to pass.

But I do recognise that there are people in Bristol who don’t like Ikea’s meatball meals, or indeed Ikea itself. So the scenario I hope I’m painting here sounds to them like one of the seven chambers of hell. Please know that I hear you. Please feel free to continue reading to find out exactly what horrors you managed to avoid.

There were four meatball meals on offer – the standard Ikea meatballs, which I guess are some kind of pork or pork-adjacent product, ‘chicken’, ‘plant balls’ – which as any of Bristol’s many veggies or vegans will be quick to tell you are actually pretty good – and falafel balls.

The falafels came with couscous and ‘aioli’, which apparently is a mayonnaise-like sauce and not the name for the latest Ikea bathroom cabinet.

The three meatballs came with the option of chips or mash, which meant that, actually, you could have six different choices each time you went up. And in fact, the kindly, smiley lady serving – she was run off her feet and must surely be in line for some kind of recognition in the New Year’s Honours List after this – offered two options of 8 meatballs or 12 meatballs, which meant your choices now doubled again to 12.

I’m not saying anyone did go up 12 times to experience each option, all I’m saying is that it was something you could possibly do.

Extras, like garlic bread or onion rings, cold plates, and the Ikea range of desserts – you had to pay for, and there were people on the tills as usual – but they mainly just waved people through after spotting a wristband.

Around the corner from the drinks refill was the meatball. The giant one. He was exploring which kind of dance moves work best from a figure which is just a giant ball with legs, and a range of various-sized young children were making suggestions through the medium of dance. It was at this point he presumably realised just how much the concept of dancing involves the arms. Which he didn’t have.

This was taking place on the main thoroughfare between drink and cutlery station and the bulk of the seating area and, given most people were crossing the impromptu dance floor carrying trays of food and drink at roughly the height of a child’s head, at times it felt like watching the start of an episode of Casualty.

The crowd was a real mix. Families old and young, lots of students who can sniff out a deal for cheap food from 23 miles, and people coming from work with their mates.

I didn’t see anyone who’d brought tupperware containers to pilfer the meatballs, but I could tell just by looking at them, that everyone thought about it and regretted not doing it.

We lasted about an hour and a half. I even tried the falafel ones – and wished I hadn’t. But after polishing off the leftovers of various family members who bloused out early, my meatball count reached 36 before the point I emerged, with ears ringing, blinking into the bright lights and normality of Ikea’s ‘Marketplace’ floor.

There, couples were absent-mindedly picking up colanders before putting them down again, very much in the real world. Over in the restaurant, an alternative reality was emerging – and like those people who get a post-Glastonbury Festival maudlin, I was left wishing life could be an Ikea Eatball Buffet all the time.