4 bits of asparagus and half an egg - how much?

[Thornyroshbush]

I went to my favourite restaurant in the world recently. Never had a plate of food I didn't love and I've probably been going 15(ish) times a year since 2018. It's 'tapas' style so you can easily have 4-5 plates in a meal. Just to give an indicating over the quality of the food.

One of the dishes we ordered to share was asparagus and a crispy egg. What turned up was four bits of asparagus and half a boiled egg in a shell (it looked a bit like a scotch egg, but no runny centre).

I'm wondering if I am being very unreasonable to still be absolutely gobsmacked over 24 hours later that anyone thought that was acceptable to send out of a kitchen at the price they charged for it. We're due to go back tomorrow night and I honestly want to cancel but DH thinks they deserve another chance...

So, can people tell me how much they would have thought that would cost?

Kept it for the other poor person who ordered the same dish. 😁

Boiled egg in a shell? So bits of broken shell as well?

That's not a crispy egg.

£15

£14

£15?

CBA to guess, but obviously it was a lot of money for not very much, but that's the way of the world these days.

Like many others, I think a lot more about eating out these days, because the amount that restaurants need to charge to cover their costs has increased so much. So I don't generally pick something I could make at home in a few minutes without any effort, skill or specialist ingredients. Like griddling some asparagus, boiling an egg and sticking it on a plate, perhaps with a drizzle of oil and some pepper sprinkled over it.

Sadly it also precludes most other tapas that I like, eg garlic prawns. I don't pay restaurant prices for those, that's what I make at home when I CBA chopping a load of veg or whatever as it takes about 5 mins. But I would pay for things like calamari or proper croquettes because I don't have a deep fat fryer and CBA fiddling around with roux and breadcrumbs. Also a lot of Asian food that requires a lot of ingredients, chopping and isn't the same at home if you don't have a big gas burner hob.

I am way too invested in this - as I keep coming back to see if we have found out the price yet.

Was the half boiled egg in its own shell? I cannot imagine this...is the shell what made it crispy? How can you cut a boiled egg in half with the shell intact? Did you take a picture?

Reminds me of one of the rare times I bought a cocktail in a bar that turned out to be a G&T made with half a small bottle of fever tree and a thimble full of cava, poured over a glass of ice. I asked if I could have the rest of the bottle of tonic and was refused. Thankfully the friends I was with felt the same and we moved on to a traditional pub where we could almost buy a round for all of us for what a cocktail cost at the fancy bar. And we got a big table where we could all sit down and actually talk to each other because there was no loud music blasting.

£12

That’s 15£ in my local restaurant atm. As a seasonal special

As one of several small plates, 5.25

I think it's this https://sociusnorfolk.co.uk/menus/
£15
Sorry op! Public Service!

£15

Are you in North Norfolk?

@susiedaisy1912 Presumably!! That’s what baffled me the most! Split between two people as their dishes are meant to be it was 1/4 of an egg and two asparagus spears each.

Just to say to others, it was de-shelled! But it was basically a hard boiled scotch egg (not what I had in mind). Half a hard boiled scotch egg.

£15 it cost. And sadly it was also completely inedible as the asparagus was very woody (they hadn’t but the ends off) and the hard boiled egg was…unpleasant. And very dry.

And yes, north Norfolk. The other dishes we ordered (I’m guessing a few of you have rigged which restaurant it was), were equally awful. Acidic beetroot. Cold focaccia and cold prawns. Steak was grissly 😩as I said never had a bad meal before but this was inedible. But £15 for four hard asparagus spears and a hard dry scotch egg took the biscuit!

Snap! Posted at the same time!

See my first bid of £14.50 😁
Can I claim an asparagus tip as a prize?

Did you Google AI too? 😄

It that case...yanbu.

Yes! 😀

Were you flippant or did you actually know it could be that? Well done 🥚🥒🥒🥒🥒

Oh, I'd have complained at that - the prices suggest that it's a nice place with proper chefs, so you'd expect everything to be perfectly prepared and absolutely lovely. It's not like it's a cheap chain pub where you have people with minimal training throwing things in fryers and onto griddles for a stated time and sending it out whether it's cooked nicely or not.

OP, you should have sent it back to the kitchen if the egg was dry. For that price, it should be perfect.

I’ll mail you some local asparagus from the petrol station nearby (got 10 thick spears for £5 yesterday!!!)

Just used to London prices...
£15 starters are not unusual now, even in chain restaurants.

Bloody hell that is shocking!

Unfortunately we’ve stopped going into our local pub to eat due to cost, they’ve just put out their summer menu, Fish and Chips £19, Steak and Chips £29!!!! Fuck that.