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Passage: The ladies were puzzled. Cheryl Spangler, Valeria Borunda Jameson and Susan Puckett, three university-admissions workers on a training visit to Florence , Kentucky , had walked into a local barbecue joint called Chung Kiwha. But instead of sauce-covered mutton served up from the kitchen, they saw a buffet of uncooked meats and vegetables. Instead of knives and forks, they were given large scissors, chopsticks and metal tongs. No candle flickered at their table, but a bucket of fiery wood charcoal hissed in the tabletop grill pit. Chung Kiwha served barbecue, all rightcook-it-your-self Korean barbecue. I didn't realize there were restaurants like this, marveled Spangler to her friends, who hail from Knoxville , Tennessee , and I worked in restaurants for 20 years. The secret is out, thanks to the growing popularity of restaurants where the customer is the chef. Long a staple of immigrant communities in big cities, restaurants where diners chop, grill, boil, or dip their dip their food are hot in the American heartland. St.Paul, Minnesota , has Thai hot-pot cooking. Indianapolis , Indiana , has Japanese shabu-shabu (another type of hot pot). A pizzeria in Las Vegas lets customers roll the dough. Why would people bother going out to cook their own meal? Americans want control, says Hudson Riehle, senior vice president of research for the National Restaurant Association. The cook-it-your-self experience embodies the American values of freedom of choice and independence. With families spending 46% of their food budget on meals outside the home, they miss the cooking experiencesort of. Psychologically, people want to be a little involved, says Pamela Parseghian, executive food editor at Nation's Restaurant News. | 
