[Closed] the cost of eating out?

Out of interest, what did you have?

Starters £5
Mains £12.50 (bit more for fist pie)
Drinks £3.50 each
If was nice...then it's good value (whether it's £50 or £500)

3 quid a drink, 6 quid a starter and 12 for main course. Pretty standard stuff tbh.

Yup - if it's good - £25 each sounds like a good deal.

Chinese in Edinburgh was £33 each inc a bottle of wine and 2 beers - excellent food so good value.
Local curry house was a bargain at £75 for three with drinks.

But if it's crap, it don't matter how much it costs.

Yep, there's a good reason folk go abroad for their holidays. Me, mrsmidlife and the crashes (3 of them) can easily get to £100, if they are getting pudding.

We have (and use) a lot of vouchers, have a Taste Card, there's always offers available if you use them.

Of course not always possible, Fri/Sat and holidays for example and not in indie places or pubs. But we have two growing daughters that like eating out, and we like taking them as sharing a meal with friends is always pleasurable so they need to know how to eat out (ordering, being polite to the waiting staff, etc.) - and paying full price for that is as you say now pretty steep.

fists are not cheap these days.... More seriously I agree main courses are now £12 in most pubs and frankly a burger or fish and chips is really good profit at those prices

i had blue cheese/spinache/salmon tart. barnsley chop.
wife had prawns/chorizo thing and lamb steak.

beer was saltaire blonde...delish.

Tastecard is a bit pish, always either chains or struggling out of the way restaurants.

Pretty standard I'd say.

Not difficult to find better price/value tho.

Sounds like a bargain actually...

i maybe dont eat out enough. it was very nice and the beer was spot on, so they get bonus points for that.

Platic tasting chilli/manky burger and crap beer from any pub called "The Two For One" (seems a lot of pubs with that name these days....confusing).

Depends on your expectation of 'value for money'. I had VFM last night, I bought a chicken fajita kit from Morrisons for .75p, reduced from £3.99 which was good value IMO. Last week 3 of us went to the local pub & had a Big pork chop, Haddock & chips, prawns & chilli dip & 3 pints for £36. We were all satisfied & stuffed & I thought it was good VFM.
I paid £72 for 2 of us at the Crannog in Fort Willy a while ago with drinks, fab food but not sure it was VFM.

That's about going rate. You can get cheaper or you can pay more too.

Pretty average. That wouldn't get you steak or owt fancy round these parts.

I don't eat out that much and not sure how people who do justify it. More of a treat than a weekly occurrence.

It travels through your system, and just fuels your body, it is nice enough at the time, but generally unmemorable.

It's nice now and again, but regularly is a waste of money IMHO.

Last holiday we went on I spent over £80 eating out twice in one day for two of us, neither meal was all that memorable, nice enough,..but £80!! I could buy some nice blingy bike stuff for that much! It's an easy trap to fall into though.

I've had two homemade burgers at home tonight, nice seeded buns, with eggs and cheese on top with the buns fried, gorgeous.... total price around £1.75 all in.

Rorschach - Member
(bit more for fist pie)

😯 😀

Tastecard is a bit pish, always either chains or struggling out of the way restaurants.

Mostly true - but for our needs, it's paid for itself several times over. 22 restaurants in our town ranging from chains like Zizzi's (decent quality, you know what you're getting) through to our local Indian.

Ton is a bit partial to fist pie.

I think you've done well if it was decent food. So many places serve 'average' food and charge way more.

£25, thats a starter price that is 🙄

[quote=midlifecrashes ]Yep, there's a good reason folk go abroad for their holidays. Me, mrsmidlife and the crashes (3 of them) can easily get to £100, if they are getting pudding.

Wow - are they good at tidying up then?

If you had a good meal and a bit of time enjoying each others company then I reckon that's money well spent.

Last meal out I paid for was £30 per head so not much different.

ton - Member

does it seem a bit pricey nowadays?

Price is not a problem if I can afford them but it's the shite food with price tag that piss me off big time. I can cook better than some of them to be honest.

Doesn't matter about what others' say but if you are not happy or satisfied with the meal it is a rip off.

I don't know about romantic dinner out as I have not done that for a very long time with any female but if I want good food it will be good traditional curry house like [url= http://aneesas.co.uk/newcastle-quayside/ ]Aneesas[/url] (about £20 with a good Cobra larger)(best chana dal I have had in UK) in GeordieLand or Westgate road's fish & Chips (the street is full of motorbike shops btw) or a very nice burger at a pub beside the GeordieLand city centre council.

Been to some Jamie what that boy's name ... it was shite.

2 mains 2 pints of cider £14.60 tonight

Reckon if you got the staff to go below min wage you could probably get it cheaper. Maybe use some low quality ingredients too.

3 courses plus wine for two in St John on Monday £101
Full sea food meal for two (lobster etc) plus G and T and 2 bottles of wine in Lisbon last week £54 (there was so much food they had to push two tables together)

It's the price of wine that pi55es me off these days, eg £7 per glass is out of order.

Don't mind paying a few quid extra for food but I expect it to be good. Will complain more these if it's below par.

Also, one of or favourite Italians charges 10% service as standard. That gets my goat too.

My local curry does a full meal for 11 quid on Wednesdays. Brilliant food and bring your own beer. But yeah, 50 quid or more is common enough elsewhere.

When we went to lunch or dinner, it was with little regard to cost. It'd likely cost 3 figures.

Only two things niggle. Micro portions, to the point where you're made to feel that the chef really is taking the pisch. I'm hungry, feed me!

Also, staff offering unsolicited advice on selections or combinations that might make the bill cheaper.
"Cheaper"! If I wanted cheaper, I'd cook at home. Furthermore, why just assume everyone wants as cheap as they can get?
It can be irritating, I find.

£50 for that ^ sounds ok.

Edit:
Spacemonkey. Your post reminds me why if I decide to eat out, I don't much care for the pricing as if it "got my goat" I'd not enjoy the experience.
Although that doesn't mean I ignore poor service or food!
If a restaurant screws up, it's "bye bye".

My local curry does a full meal for 11 quid on Wednesdays

How happy was I when my two 6 year old girls said they wanted to go there for their 'well done' meal at getting good reports from school last Sunday 🙂

All in (including drinks and ice creams for the little ladies) it came to just over £40 and I couldn't stand straight for days 🙂

Eating out outside of London always seems shit and a rip off. At least when you eat something in London you can expect its going to be better or more interesting than you get at home; normally outside its a load of tosh.

It's the price of wine that pi55es me off these days, eg £7 per glass is out of order.

Me too. I guess the business model is to make low margin on the food and high margin on the wine. I suppose it means it's easy to avoid paying the margin by not drinking too much (and healthier too) but it does seem odd that the bit that is so easy for the restaurant is the bit they make so much mark up on. It's also the bit most of us are most easily able to compare to what we pay off the shelf at the supermarket which makes it even harder to stomach- paying £30 for a bottle of a lesser quality than the one I can buy for £7 at the supermarket that you have done no more than chill for me is hard to take.

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Binners.

I now see you aspire to be the richest man alive, never to have 'lived'.

Greggs! All round, For everyone!
😆

Ahh remembuh when yokud gah out tetpickshuz watch dan dare and n the range busters, yur kud git tomnibus therenbak, yur shoooos shahhhned, a 'aircut, two steak dinnuz, a go ont ferris wheel and blurrjob all fet 2d. Ah telt thee.

Stabilizer.

Your spell check appears to have expired.
🙂

it's in yokkshur, for tons benefit

Ah, ok! Gotcha.

Is there a Mac version?

2 starters, 2 mains, 4 drinks, £50

Sounds cheap to me.

I don't eat out very often, so when I do, I like to go somewhere really good, and that means £££.

I don't eat out very often, so when I do, I like to go somewhere really good, and that means £££.

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?

living in the south, £25 a head is what you'd spend on 5 pints and a posh scotch egg at the pub.

So if i had a good meal and a couple of drinks for that i'd be pretty content.

I suppose it means it's easy to avoid paying the margin by not drinking too much (and healthier too) but it does seem odd that the bit that is so easy for the restaurant is the bit they make so much mark up on. It's also the bit most of us are most easily able to compare to what we pay off the shelf at the supermarket

It's because people compare food prices to decide where to eat. Nobody ever compares the wine.

So £9 for pizza seems cheap, let's go there for our tea. Wham, the bill arrives and you've spend more on 2 glasses of Pinot Grigio that you have on food.

And if you are savy you will probably also have a voucher for 50% off the pizza. So sod it, the extra glass of wine is fine since we are getting a cheap meal, oh but now I'm a bit fuzzy I must have that £5 desert that cost the resaurant 30p to make.

Same deal with soft drinks as well, they have the highest mark up of anything, but nobody is sat in a restaurant saying that they could be sat at home drinking a 20p can of coke instead.

There are only three legitimate reasons for eating out:
Easter
Christmas
The last night of your summer holiday.

Everything else is luxury and extravagance which goes against every thrifty bone in my body 😡

living in the south, £25 a head is what you'd spend on 5 pints and a posh scotch egg at the pub.
So if i had a good meal and a couple of drinks for that i'd be pretty content.

Bargain. 5 pints up here of proper beer, which Ton likes, would cost you neatly £25 so you'd have a bag of scratchings.

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I find eating out normally costs me a couple of bottles of Lambrini and a fish supper......

There are only three legitimate reasons for eating out:
Easter
Christmas
The last night of your summer holiday.

[s]Easter[/s] No - eat at home with family
[s]Christmas [/s]No - eat at home with family
[s]The last night of your summer holiday[/s] No - eat out every night on holiday

living in the south, £25 a head is what you'd spend on 5 pints and a posh scotch egg at the pub.