I
read this week that a couple of dedicated Guardian writers spent £324
on a meal for two and came out wringing those hands, not already occupied with
making out their petty cash claims, with sanctimonious horror.
The cost was apparently justified by an article that sought to raise important questions about the cost of meals in some London restaurants. Yet why did they bother? Those of us who assumed that the majority of journalists, even Guardian journalists, all regularly ate meals of similar extravagance at their employer's expense couldn't help but wonder what all the fuss was about.
Most people look at the prices in a restaurant's window before venturing in and so are prepared financially and emotionally when the bill is exactly as advertised. I agree that £324 does seem a bit high for lunch for two, and I would recommend their editor examine the duo's submitted receipts carefully for signs of tampering, but in a city where young men barely out of short trousers can earn six figure sums for bawling at each other down telephones in featureless skyscrapers in Canary Wharf, is it really that much?
There have always been restaurants which charge a great deal of money. Mostly these restaurants cluster around the areas where money flows in great abundance – Mayfair, Knightsbridge, the City, Notting Hill etc. And they have no problems filling tables. Obviously were they to open in somewhere like Streatham they might find the going a little tougher, assuming they weren’t petrol bombed within the first week.
Prices have two functions. On the one hand a high price is intended to reflect the high quality of the ingredients, the skill with which they have been prepared, the ambience and comfort of the restaurant and the prime location. On the other hand they may be high simply to keep the poor out. Many a star footballer, who would cheerfully pronounce a boiled rat delicious if he was charged £100 for it, are happy to pay high prices if it means the other diners will also be celebrities and so unlikely to harass them for an autograph or get ugly about the missed penalty last Saturday. The food is immaterial,what counts is being seen to be conspicuously spending. ‘Pop stars’ will cover themselves in the sort of gold jewellery that Liberace might have blanched at and drink nasty, but expensive, champagne for the same reasons. It is in many ways a display of virility (if male) and of success (if female). As that great social commentator, public schoolboy and proletariat taunter Harry Enfield once said, ‘shut your mouths and look at my wad!’ Whatever happened to him, by the way?
But at the end of the day those restaurants that charge high prices merely to filter out the less desirable customers nearly always end up going broke. Fashion is fickle and the rich people that once paid the bills move on to give another establishment their temporary and dubious patronage. The simple fact is that the majority of restaurants charge what they think they can get away with. Rather like journalists doing their expenses.
Note to london-eating editor:
In addition to fee, please note
Research meal £250
Fact finding trip to London £135 (1st class return)
Taxis £45
Harry Enfield DVD collection £45
Escort service for visit to restaurant £250
Sundries £134
Please remit and oblige.
