Finding it increasingly difficult to justify eating out at pubs etc

We used to eat out a couple of times a week but haven't at all for about 18 months because it's just too expensive. I really miss it. I like going out and I like food I HAVENT HAD TO COOK.

Pub type restaurants especially are just not worth it, and the food is never very good - definitely not as good as DHs cooking. We stopped going years ago for that reason. We do still get curry takeaways, which, for a while, were significantly cheaper than pub restaurants, but even those are going up now.

Weirdly in our town, we have 2 pizza takeaways, which are still fairly cheap, so still get those occasionally. Cost of drinks is just ridiculous, relative to the cost of a bottle of wine from a supermarket - the difference has gradually increased over the years.

I'm amazed at how full all our cafes and restaurants seem to be though. I've always been a bit sceptical of the CoL crisis because of it TBH - some people might be struggling, but plenty aren't.

This. Better restaurants less frequently.

Have never been one for pub food though.

We say this all the time. We used to have dinner out just for a quick tea type thing. Now we only go out for somewhere really nice that we know will be good and it’s a lot less frequent. Same with takeaways- I will just cook and we only get takeaways if we have a big day trip out and get back late.

Pàid £4.50 for q slice of dryish coffee cake, DH had vi toria sponge filled with artificial cream £4 at a national trust.

So next time it will be just a cup of tea.

Working in a restaurant I can honestly say it's no wonder so many go out of business. Labour costs and controlling them is such a huge issue every single day. Minimum wage is now £12.21 per hour and you don't get decent chefs and bartenders and waitresses for £12.21. The reason IMO why service is usually worse than it used to be now is that the industry standard of how many tables a server should have has increased. Back in even 2018 it would be usual for one waitress to have 5 tables in her section, or maybe 6 if they were all 2 tops. Now it is more likely to be at least 8, often more. Less bodies is a simple way to reduce massive staffing costs - but this is why it feels we now wait endlessly for bills, extra drinks, orders to be taken...

I'd honestly rather just go to cafes with counter service where this isnt a problem, or occasionally splurge on a very expensive small restaurant with top quality service. Spending £70-80 for mediocre isn't worth it to me.

We live in the south east but often work in the north West. There is a noticeable difference in prices and portion sizes! Which also leads to a noticeable difference in how busy the restaurants are - they are bustling on a weekday evening in just a normal town like Bolton whereas in our town in Kent many are empty and struggling to survive

I agree, pretty much all pub food is the sort of meal it would be very easy to recreate at home.
The only pub meal i’ll occasionally entertain spending money on is a carvery because cooking a decent roast can be as expensive as a pub and time consuming.
We will order in or eat out for Indian, Chinese, Thai and Sushi. I feel like a lot of cooking skill that I don’t posses goes into a good curry.

Equally, I look at these businesses and wonder how they make ends meet when people pay c.£25 for a meal with a drink, including ingredients, staffing, utility bills, insurance etc. It’s a wonder they manage to keep going.

I go out occasionally to michelin starred restaurants or nice non chain places that have been recommended. I'd much rather go out once a year and pay £150 for an amazing experience.

We basically never have dinner out, but we do tend to go to a cafe for breakfast/brunch once a week, usually around £25 for 2 people.

I much prefer going for a coffee/cake etc and that's how I socialise rather than at a restaurant, or again, breakfast with friends. It's so much cheaper and you still can be there for an hour and a half, having two hot drinks, and you won't spend as much.

I also work in a restaurant. It's extremely (EXTREMELY) busy and extremely expensive and I'm always frankly baffled at how many people are willing to pay the prices. Obviously glad they do 😂 but a typical meal with soft drinks and either a side or starter where I work will set you back easily £70 for a couple and I think that is a lot of money for a dinner out.

I am finding it increasingly difficult to afford going out at all even for coffee and a sandwich, paid £10 the other day for a cheese toastie and a cappuchino in a local cafe the other day. It was about £7.50p a year ago. Did a moderately big shop today at Asda, it was £55, nothing extravagant, no ready meals as I cook a lot and menu plan. I and a few mates used to go out once a month to eat out, see a film and have a couple of drinks but we have had to cut this down to once every couple of months, no meal and maybe have a coffee before we see the film. Things are so costly and not very good value for what you get

Agreed, we used to go regularly to a lovely local bistro for a lunch/early supper but the prices now are around £17-18 for a main course, so we've had to cut back on that unfortunately.

We're just back from a supposedly very expensive Scandinavian city and similar style places for lunch were £14-15, so prices here are getting ridiculously high.

Best value meal out we’ve had lately is at a BeefEater. At lunch time, I had a veggie lasagne for £7 with their lunch specials.
At lunch time they also had really nice rump steak for just £14or £15.

We’ve also stopped going out for meals much anymore - not that we can’t afford to necessarily…. But because we don’t like feeling like we’ve been fleeced!
Once lockdown lifted, we went to a little village pub where they were charging £17 for a plate of chargrilled broccoli cheese!

The food has to be amazing, freshly made and not something I can or would cook at home. Even a place I use to frequent more than once a month, had me thinking this just isn’t worth it anymore. I’ve ate out 5 times this year and I’d only visit 2 of these again as the others just cost too much for what you get nowadays

Life is unrecognisable now, the things we used to take for granted but are having to do the maths first every single time. I also agree it’s not just the expense, it’s the service.

I can only really justify McDonald’s now and Pizza Hut buffet. No gastro pubs anymore.

completely agree

Also you only need to learn some very basic cooking skills to make similar quality food at home at a lot cheaper price

We were thinking of having a pub lunch the other day, burger and chips was £25, absolutely no chance am I paying that.

Totally agree op, even mcdonalds and Burger king are expensive 😫

Homemade take aways for us. I can't justify spending the £££ on eating out. After Christmas me, dh and dd went out for a meal. One main course each, dh had a cola me and dd had tap water.. Bill was just shy of £100. Food was nothing fancy just pub food type of things.

the biggest cost rise hasn’t been wages - it’s gas and electricity, the running cost of this alone has forced the prices to rise so much.

yes inflation and other costs haven’t helped, but the cost of gas and electricity has made inflation rise even recently

drill baby drill 🙈

I also agree!
We have a small chain pub close by and we'll only eat there with a code/voucher deal. Even then it can hit £100 with 2+2teens.
(We also check who's cooking- an actual cook/chef or the potwash kids who's working on the cooks day off 😅)
'Nicer' meals out were defo doing a lot less and we'll chose something we're unlikely to do better at home
We are all good cooks but enjoy eating out.

Have you noticed that wetherspoon food has gone up in price by a lot too!

We never eat out now because it's too expensive for tiny portions. I went to Wendy's the other day and got a wrap for 4 quid...took it out of the wrapping and it had been folded in half so it was child's size with one piece of chicken inside.

We bring packed lunches on days out and have friends for dinner but don't eat out. No takeaways either - we used to maybe once a month but don't ever do it now as the value is just not good enough.

You are all saying the things that I am thinking.
We restrict ourselves to the "two meals for..." value box on the menu, and I get a lasagne which is always worse than a frozen individual microwave lasagne from netto. And we aren't even posh foodie people.

DH made a home made lasagne last night, topping it up health-wise with kidney beans to bulk out the beef, so I'm not sure why we bother going out - though we do if en route to butlins or something. We ought to stop with these "gastro" pubs. So many are grotty, filthy chairs and carpets, sticky stained menus too.