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

Yanbu. It’s hard to get away with less than £100 for a family with teenagers now, even at fairly ‘basic’ places like the chains you’ve mentioned . I miss the £5 kids menu deals from 10 years ago when they were in the early primary school years.

I think there is a balance to be struck though, if it was a bit cheaper then more people would go and profits would be higher - the actual food doesn't cost much at all so having 8 people paying £16 each would be far more profitable than 3 people affording to pay £25 each

I budget £100 for the two of us for starter, main and a bottle of wine to share, maybe a coffee. I'd expect to pay £200 for 4 of us.

Pizza Express wouldn't be my restaurant of choice, though.

everything so expensive these days!

We had nandos takeaway for 3 friday night £60 - was cold by the time we sorted out the fact that we had no code for delivery guy. Such poor value for money

We went to PE recently and for 4 adults it was £157.00!! That included only 1 alcoholic drink. Think how many fillet steaks that would buy. I do agree that desserts are very expensive and often disappointing.

My 8 year old will almost eat a whole regular pizza to himself, my 2 year old will have a kids meal (£5 main only) and a small milk. And me and DH will share a large pizza. We rarely go out for a meal but we were on holiday. It was nice. If our boys were older, then I do think it would be a lot more expensive. Something I'll need to take account for when that time comes.

I agree with this as I personally feel ripped off if went to a chain and had to spend full price as the quality isn't great. We go to local pub with really good food and buy lots of starters things like prawns and swiss cheese chips and they are all quite large servings it is more like £40 for two with a glass of wine each. I went to a Thai restaurant recently and it is much better value as starters included it was £110 for 4.

YANBU.

There was an interesting Tom Kerridge series recently where he talked about the economics of restaurants - he said (and I've seen the same figure quoted elsewhere) that the ingredients of a dish should be 30% of the menu price, the other 70% being overheads/costs including profit. A quick google suggests this is an industry standard.

And yet I look at some dishes and their prices and see ingredients that cost waaaay below 30% of what they're charging. Especially if it's vegetarian (Jay Rayner talked about "margins being better on vegetarian food" which seems to translate as "You get to charge more for cheaper ingredients") and...that's not OK. A mate was talking about starting a street food pizza van because, and I quote, "the margins are INSANE!" - as posters have said above, dough costs nothing, toppings are relatively inexpensive, and they charge high prices simply because they can.

So there's an awful of over-charging going on. For the big chains I suspect it's because their private equity owners want to keep their profits up but I resent paying those bloody prices - wherever they are - when it seems such a rip off.

For the decent/indie places trying to serve at reasonable prices, why not just make cheaper dishes? Lots of ingredients are still relatively cheap - make a dish out of that and serve it at a reasonable price, rather than carrying on serving the same menu that doesn't work any more without a big price tag.

But I wouldn’t eat at a chain for 25pp I’d go Indy.

All of those places have discount schemes ?? 2for 1. Free starters. Etc. if you go to a chain check Martin’s money tips

pizza express even have their own app for it.

but no not really £25 pp including drinks and service is about right. Teens eat adult portions

Ahhhh yes, The kids menu and the chicken can be the take home for next 9 day

It clearly isn't 'enough for anyone,' as you can see by the majority of comments on this thread. I don't actually believe you're 'shocked' at this.

But it’s ok because the chicken they’ve roasted will last the next 6 days.

As predicted we have the mumsnet competitive under eating and thrift
4 adults eating 2 pizza and 1 starter for 4
adults eating kid menu and I bet it’s so Huuuuuge they take home in a box
or the no one gets a whole pizza family, cause that is the rules. So don’t ask
Eating out is a treat - no one should be eating out more than 1-2 times per year

When in Cornwall I paid £37.50 for two large g+t's (Bombay sapphire) and 2 small cokes. I thought the barman said 27.50 and just tapped. When I checked the prices it was correct (£37.50) in a bog standard pub!

A pizza express pizza per person is entirely reasonable.
A glass of wine is much nicer than only a glass of tap water.
Why must that meal be dinner? Who cares what time it’s eaten.

Its £25:00 for a pizza hut and thats delivery probably be even more in the restaurant tbh. Take aways from big names have become extortionate. I stick to the independents these days. I've litterally boycotted them.

Agree. I'm a big fan as it's healthy fast food but now too pricey for what you get. I got a quarter chicken the other day with 2 sides as its the cheapest meal but the Broccoli was waterlogged and the chicken tiny and shrivelled.

I usually make the salad my go to but that's like £20 with chicken added. It's just not worth it.

Spicy rice is now a teeny tiny portion. For about £4-5. I aways used to add it to my salad as I love it.

We used to go at least once a week. Get the points. I'm giving up.

I also find a pub meal is at least £100 for microwaved /deep fried food.

We really like eating out. We are well off and work hard. Meals out get us away from our desks and give us a proper break. I haven't always got the time or the energy to make a fake away and my dc like different things.

I support my local restaurants but nandos was the last chain I've really loved. I have given up on so many chains for passing that expensive/mediocre barrier. I have stopped going to Pizza express, wagamamas, TGIs, even yo! Sushi.

Totally agree on pizza express! We stopped going there for that reason. Biggest mark up imaginable, it’s just dough, tomato, cheese. If you have meat it’s a tiny portion

It’s 4 adult portions, £25 not unreasonable.
I personally wouldn’t eat at a chain like that without an offer it’s bogof if you buy a supermarket version of their pizza.
I look for offers or lunch deals. Went out with a friend and paid £12 for a large pizza and soft drink 2 days ago, needed to be seated before 6.30pm.

We tried a newish local independant pizza place last week - 2 adults and DD 15 - no liquor licence so just soft drinks. One shared starter and 3 mains was £90. Lunch yesterday for DH and I in a pub was £45 for just food. Was Chiswick but just a normal pub and not even that great. All Sunday roasts locally are now over £20, usually between £22 and £28.

YANBU it's a lot isn't it.

Ate out in Italy on holiday. Pizzas (huge and delicious) were 8-10 euros each. Wine about 5 euros a glass. Our bill for 4 including a drink each was less than 60 euros / about £50. Trying to work out why UK is now so much more expensive.

ime,£30 / head for a lunch or evening meal out.
£100 to feed 4 sounds like a bargain to me.

Where do people easily find coupons or whatever to make it much cheaper to eat at Pizza Express?

How far back are you thinking of? I'm an 80s/90s child-teen and definitely ate out for less then luxury reasons.