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Restaurant pricing

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby RockyBVI » Thu Aug 12, 2021 1:56 pm

aero280 wrote:There was a local restaurant in the village that we went to years ago that we stopped going to. It's changed hands a few times and has been a chinese and Italian, but the memory lingers...

We went there for supper. They had a regular set menu and on Wednesday is was coq au vin. We ordered the set meal, but a slice of dried up steak pie arrived! We queried this and got the answer "Steak pie is the set meal for Tuesday, but we didn't sell all of it, and it won't keep until next week" :o


How extraordinary! Almost amusing. Almost! Some friends went to a restaurant in BVI and ordered the very expensive lamb. She was served pork, but liked pork and understood that on an island you can't always get the things you need. Whent he owner came over to ask how the meal was, she jokingly said it was a good job she liked pork. He banned the whole party from the restaurant :shock:

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby Stokey Sue » Thu Aug 12, 2021 4:52 pm

Pepper Pig wrote:Jay Rayner on restauarant wine pricing.

https://www.theguardian.com/food/2021/a ... jay-rayner

I agree with him

I disagree with friends who moan about paying £22 in a restaurant for a wine they could buy in Sainsbury’s for £7, they seem to think they should pay no contribution to the cost of providing glasses, premises and services - those costs are less obvious in the food where you probably don’t know the unit cost of the ingredients and it’s easier to recognise the contribution of the kitchen

He misses one category- there are restaurants who list a house wine at £22, nothing else under £35 and sneer if you order house

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby KeenCook2 » Thu Aug 26, 2021 1:43 pm

Hello, wanted to share the amazing meal we had at Alain Ducasse at The Dorchester yesterday. We were invited to celebrate my cousin's (belated!) 90th birthday.
This was the menu:
https://www.alainducasse-dorchester.com ... August.pdf

What a treat. It was really stunning - we'd never been to a 3 star Michelin restaurant before so it was an altogether new experience. The food was fantastic; the service was not too fawning - just the right amount of attention. We were incredibly fortunate to be invited - but both felt that £70 for an outstanding meal with wine, water and coffee would be worth every penny.

There were 3 sets of amuse-bouches before the starter, and also before the dessert, and 2 different types of butter - one whipped, and the other kind of lemony (?!) - couldn't identify what it was.
Then I had the poached egg, OH had the seafood.

Oops, will have to do a couple of new posts so I can add more pics ....
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poached egg as presented.JPG
poached egg as presented.JPG (34.43 KiB) Viewed 3324 times
butters and caponata on seed amuse bouche.JPG
butters and caponata on seed amuse bouche.JPG (40.51 KiB) Viewed 3323 times
tomato amuse bouche.JPG
tomato amuse bouche.JPG (25.85 KiB) Viewed 3323 times

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby KeenCook2 » Thu Aug 26, 2021 1:47 pm

Here are the egg and seafood, and pork with artichokes - which we both had.
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seafood.JPG
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poached egg.JPG
poached egg.JPG (36.54 KiB) Viewed 3322 times
pork and artichoke.JPG
pork and artichoke.JPG (39.01 KiB) Viewed 3322 times

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby liketocook » Thu Aug 26, 2021 1:54 pm

Looks amazing KC2, what lovely experience. :yum

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby KeenCook2 » Thu Aug 26, 2021 1:56 pm

And here are the petits fours/patisserie, chocs and strawberry dessert, which we both had.
The red on the dessert was a crisp white chocolate shell ...

Apparently Ducasse visits once a month to make sure things are going properly - he was in Biarritz yesterday.

Needless to say the coffee was excellent. (I had decaff.)
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petits fours and chocs.JPG
petits fours and chocs.JPG (35.39 KiB) Viewed 3315 times
dessert.JPG
dessert.JPG (29.13 KiB) Viewed 3315 times

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby Pepper Pig » Thu Aug 26, 2021 1:57 pm

Wow! Stunning. 8-)

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby Stokey Sue » Thu Aug 26, 2021 1:59 pm

That all looks wonderful!

Glad you had a good time

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby Suffs » Thu Aug 26, 2021 2:05 pm

Looks gorgeous ... glad you had such a lovely time :D

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby Sloe-Gin » Thu Aug 26, 2021 5:26 pm

Deep envy.

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby RockyBVI » Thu Aug 26, 2021 5:39 pm

Wow - beautiful pics. I'm glad you had such a nice time.

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby Earthmaiden » Thu Aug 26, 2021 11:31 pm

I've been dying to know what you chose! It all looks wonderful and a fitting way to celebrate a 90th birthday. (Who's next?)

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby herbidacious » Sat Aug 28, 2021 8:29 pm

Looks amazing, KC2.

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby jeral » Sat Aug 28, 2021 9:18 pm

It does all look very inviting indeed :)

What did the birthday boy/girl think to the eating of it and the obvious precision of presentation? Do you reckon he/she is already planning where to go for his/her 91st? 8-)

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby KeenCook2 » Sat Aug 28, 2021 9:41 pm

Jeral, the birthday girl was delighted - especially with her birthday candle, and it came with a Happy Birthday chocolate label :D Definitely for her 91st :D

You can see the other desserts in that pic, the blackberry vacherin - we had to ask what that was, as our first thought was the cheese ... and the choc and hazelnut dessert ....
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Birthday candle.JPG
Birthday candle.JPG (37.49 KiB) Viewed 3170 times

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby jeral » Sun Aug 29, 2021 1:07 am

That's great as you never really know if someone will take to food they might not be used to.

On the desserts, I'd happily go for both if it were my birthday and given half a chance.

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby herbidacious » Sat Oct 02, 2021 11:01 am

This is not a restaurant thing per se but husband went for a drink with an ex-colleague (who was trying to persuade him to work for him) near Victoria in London last night. The ex-colleague dashed off leaving husband with the bill to settle. It came to £60! T had a glass of wine and a beer, friend had three glasses of wine. Scrutinizing the bill, two of the wines were about £14 a glass each :o

It's over 9 years since I last drank wine, so I don't notice prices, but really this seems rather a lot!

To bring it back to restaurants, the BBC ran an article yesterday (?) about threatened restaurant price hikes.

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby Earthmaiden » Sat Oct 02, 2021 11:55 am

No wonder he dashed off! Be glad he didn't drink cocktails!

Sadly, these prices don't surprise even a provincial girl like me. I've had several discussions about nights out on the town locally with people lately and the cost is way above the means of the average person. It's a case of get into debt or don't socialise. The fact it's no longer acceptable to go out and just have a couple of drinks doesn't help (not in your OH's case of course but generally). I suppose we have to face the fact that overheads are high - especially if we demand decent wages for staff.

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby liketocook » Sat Oct 02, 2021 12:09 pm

Ouch herbi that's hefty prices even for city prices assuming they were standard glasses that's £56 a bottle :shock: (though buying a bottle would probably have been cheaper)- I hope they enjoyed it!
I suspect the cost is a major factor in why so many young people drink first before heading out on the town.

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Re: Restaurant pricing

Postby Stokey Sue » Sat Oct 02, 2021 4:49 pm

Buying a bottle no longer seems to be much cheaper in most pubs and bars, they just round up the price of the glass a bit so it’s e.g. £5 not £4.67 for a 125ml glass from a £28 bottle and often there’s no difference at all

I wouldn’t expect to pay £14 for a glass of wine for quaffing in a pub or bar, but of course it would be quite normal for some wines to be that price in a serious wine bar like Noble Rot, where part of the pleasure is having one glass of something you wouldn’t want to pay for a whole bottle of

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