£100 for a casual lunch out for 4 is too much

Honestly, £25 a head for a meal out seems perfectly reasonable to me these days

i started making my own pizzas because of this, and after some practice they are amazing. you also dont realise how cheap they are too compared to shop bought ones or restaurant. You can make 3 good size margarita type ones for under £5 easily.

I’m a healthy weight and eat a pizza to
myself, i would hate sharing my food in a restaurant, and couldn’t go to sleep hungry.

Went to pizza express yest for first time in ages and could not believe the price of a pizza - £20 each! I’m sure they were more like £12 only a couple of years ago !

Yeah it’s getting ridiculous and increasingly I’m noticing that the quality is slipping, so more often than not now I’m coming out of a bog standard chain, £100 lighter, having not even really enjoyed my meal!

Went out in June with 2 kids to a local pub ( not posh, just local and normal) had a steak, child 1 had a burger, child 2 had cheesy chips, 2 softdrinks and a half pint, 2 ice cream Sundays. £75! Thought was very expensive! BUT we had a lovely time and it was a rare treat!
Had a wetherspoons last month, less than £30. But I personally don't like whetherspoons and also I realise it's great value. But I'd rather have the other meal every few months than a wetherspoons once a month!

Get an Ooni, or similar, pizza oven for home if you want that sort of food. DH has the wood pellet one and the pizzas he does in there are far nicer.

We used to eat out quite frequently but noticed that the quality of ingredients was reducing but the cost was rising. Started to grudge paying for worse food than we could cook at home so very rarely go out for dinner unless a special occasion.

Business owners and staff at our locals say it's been made much harder for them with NI etc. They can't hire the staff they'd like to, and there's a lot more to dealing with a restaurant/serving staff/paperwork/government red tape etc than a lot of diners realise. If you're going to a place that does waiting on, they have to employ servers without ever really being sure how many diners will come/what they'll order.
Shame for the staff and customers-I agree it's too expensive to do it as often as we'd like. I don't hate to cook, but I used to enjoy the days/nights out with friends and family, enjoying someone bringing it to us.

Hard disagree. Pizza Express portions aren’t big, and have got smaller. If you’d said nobody needs the wine I’d have agreed.

Yes really hard to eat out as a family of 4 these days, we’ve cut down massively, as just can’t afford to do it. When we do go, we don’t drink alcohol and just get the kids a pudding. The think is, the price has gone up to £100, but it’s still as hard to earn £100 as it was when going for dinner cost £50/60

My teen son eats at least 3000 calories a day, sometimes more depending on how much sport he plays. He would laugh in my face if I told him he was sharing a pizza. He would eat a whole one, dough balls and desert without breaking a sweat! I might myself have about half of one (usually have salad as it happens! but certainly my other teen and DH can easily polish one off each.

I was about to say the same, we will never pay for overpriced pizza out now when we can make amazing pizzas at home :)

But it’s totally irrelevant that you eat your main meal in the evening!

The point of the thread was four pizzas, wine etc cost over £100.

Because you personally don’t eat a main meal at lunchtime is not the point, the food etc is the same.

You would pay more for the food six hours later would you?

My teens don’t eat a whole pizza to themselves. I don’t as an adult who is a healthy weight. There’s your solution.

we have 5 kids and eat as a family of 7 at pizza express for about £85 because we don’t allow them to all get a full size pizza each.

Massive salad?
Don't be so greedy, a small one is quite sufficient for a family of four to share.

Have you ever had a pizza express pizza? Certainly our family could not split 2 between 4 but we might be greedy!

In my experience, Pizza Express, Bills, etc was £80 with two teens ten or more years ago. I think the prices just stayed low for longer than expected.

And again, I didnt say that.

I said that I eat my main meal (usually) in the evening, but if I ate a "dinner" at lunchtime then I wouldnt eat a dinner in the evening as well. So with that logic, I would have paid £100 for dinner for four which I think is fine.

Is eating out really that much of a luxury … I mean it is now in the UK at these prices. But I feel like across the world for hundreds of years, it’s been common for families to gather at small local cafes, pubs and eateries and they weren’t/aren’t all just patronised by the uber rich? Of course not every day but every now and then …

I’m shocked at all the people saying that they need a pizza a person at Pizza Express… my DH is a grown man and I have a teen and a tween and we would share two pizzas. Three huge slices of pizza is enough for anyone for dinner.

I love the kids meals at Prezzo, we can order a pizza flatbread for 4.99 and it comes with a ‘starter’ of garlic dough balls or similar and is enough for an adult. Takeaway meal for 4 for 20.

I would have agreed with you pre-2022. But I went to Pizza Express earlier in the year and the pizzas have shrunk in size considerably. I was still hungry after mine, in the good old days I would have struggled to finish one there.

The OP said that £100 is a lot for lunch, and I agree that it is. However, what she ordered is not what I would consider lunch. I would consider it dinner so £100 for dinner for four isnt a lot. I also wouldnt drink wine at lunch, so that would bring the price down.

That you saw anyone saying that they wouldnt eat that much as infering that you are an "oinking great big fat hog" says rather more about your self image than anything I said.

Only at lunchtime… evening is ok.

Op could just order a Massive Salad for the four of them