October 23, 2006
Expensive Entrees
The hottest article over at the New York Times this weekend wasn't about Iraq, the World Series, or even that delusional Yale kid's video resume. No, Saturday's most-e-mailed article was a report that the $40 entree has popped up on menus in New York restaurants and across the country.
Although some restaurateurs interviewed for the article said that they'd jacked up prices beyond the psychological $40 barrier in response to increasing costs, a "menu engineer" -- which, incidentally, sounds as if it were a profession that might appear in Stanley Bing's popular book -- suggested that including even a single staggering price on a menu will drive up the average check. How? By making lower-priced entrees appear more reasonable in comparison.
D.C. certainly boasts its share of expensive eateries. Indeed, more than a few have already priced some entrees at $40 -- or more. Le Paradou's take on the veal chop -- "Côte de Veau à l’Os Poêlée, Pommes Cocottes aux Artichauts et Olives ‘Picholines’" -- will set you back deux Jacksons, or a cool $40. At Teatro Goldoni, the "Costoletta Di Vitello Arrostita Servita Con Patate Novelle Al Forno E Funghi Misti" (a/k/a "veal chop with roasted potatoes and mushrooms") runs an amazing $43.50. You know, because baby cow costs more in Italian.
But if you head out to Falls Church, the New York strip steak at Jonathan Krinn's 2941 goes for $53. Not to be outdone, Charlie Palmer Steak -- that restaurant of excellent food but mediocre service down by the Capitol -- offers two entrees priced at more than $40 each (three entrees, if you count the $81 "Porterhouse for Two," which comes out to $40.50 a person): the surf-and-turf for $43 and the "Butter Braised Maine Lobster" for a stunning $59. No longer on Charlie's menu is the Snake River Farm wagyu sirloin, which topped the list at a whopping $68. And it can't even kiss you goodnight.
Of course, $40 entrees -- and even $68 entrees -- are modest outlays compared to the $350 tasting menu at New York's Masa and the $360 tasting menu at Las Vegas' Joël Robuchon at the Mansion. But they are by no means cheap. If we're even going to think about spending that kind of money on food during a night out, it's going to be on a tasting menu at a place such as Restaurant Eve or Komi, where at least you get far more bang for your buck.
Have you ever paid $40 or more for an entree? Excluding having the corporate card to play with, under what circumstances would you shell out that much money for a single plate of food? And what would you expect for $40?
Photo by flickr user booboo_momo and used under a Creative Commons license.
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For 40 bucks it better be something I would have a hard time reproducing at home, accompanied by impeccable service, and that leaves me impressed.
If I had the cash to swing $40 steaks at Sam & Harry's, I'd do it. I'd rather have good steaks than a super fancy car or an Olympic size swimming pool.
The most impressive trick has been moving these prices up MUCH faster than inflation, according to the article:
[Bobby Flay's] entrees at Mesa Grill in New York top out at $34. (When it opened in 1991, the steepest entree was $19, or $28.30 when adjusted for inflation.)
For a $40 entree I need to be blown away; it's gotta be perfect in every way.
I think you can lay the blame on the food porn served up daily by the Food Network. Having all that crazy stuff on every day normalizes the ridiculous extravagance that leads to $40 entrees.
Which basically explains the success behind places that sell tapas. You can get several small plates for what you'd pay for one big $40 meal. And you don't have to feel obligated to finish it if it sucks.
Or you could just take your money to the Texas Cheesecake Suppository. Big steaming pile of artery-clogging goodness and you have enough leftovers to club a harp seal to death. Now THAT's value!
But still can't get a decent slice of pizza at any price.
Whatever- for a top restaurant it shouldn't be surprising. Heck, my 10 course at Moto in Chicago this past weekend was $260 per person (2 of us) including wine and tip. It's certainly possible to beat that at places like Ambria in Chicago where your bill can easily approach 600 for 2 people, or the French Laundry in Napa. Bottom line is that if you go to a top tier restaurant, expect to pay for it.
J: I think that the one of the points of the article, though, was that it's not just happening at top restaurants. Of course, if one were to visit Per Se, Le Bec-Fin, Citronelle, or CityZen, one must expect to pay out the wazoo. I would argue that some diners even think that the high cost of their meal validates their experience; it tells them that they're having a great meal because they paid a lot of money for it.
But should Teatro Goldoni be charging $43.50 for an entree? The easy answer is sure, if people are going to pay it. But the harder question is whether Teatro Goldoni -- and indeed some of the places mentioned in this post and in the New York Times article -- should be classified as a "top restaurant," as you say. And what makes a $40 plate worth it in any event?
But still can't get a decent slice of pizza at any price.
Check out Three Brothers Pizza; it's not the best pizza I've ever had, but it's not bad and better than anything else you can find in the area.
Michael: While I understand that point you kind of answered your own question. Should Teatro Goldini be classified as a top restaurant? Probably not, but with the average wage and cost of living in NY I just can't buy that a $40 entree is that outrageous. Personally the only restaurants with entrees worth anything over about $25 in the DC area might be Vidalia, Citronelle, Nora, Asia Nora, 2941, Inn at Little Washington, Komi and Palena. (And yes, I'm deliberately leaving out chains and focusing on local restaurants.)
That said, on a side argument I strongly disagree with Seitsma that DC is a booming locality of food culture with top chefs. We've got a few, but let's be realistic. But that's another argument.
L'Espinasse, which used to be in the DC Ritz Carlton a few years back, had a dish called "White Truffle Risotto" that was $115 IIRC.
It was really good though.
(and for pizza go to Pomodoro's in Fairfax/Dulles or Buon Appetito in Chantilly)
J: Unquestionably, what D.C. diners should tolerate in terms of costs is different from what New York diners should. And we could have a field day discussing whether the District was, is, and will be a booming food town. Let's just say that I agree that there are far more $40 entrees on menus here than there should be.
(For pizza, my go-to is Alberto's in Dupont Circle. Next is the Italian Store. But if I'm ever out in the Oakton/Vienna area, I tend to like Luciano.)
See, that's the funny thing about capitalism. At a certain point, it stops being about how good the product is (be it cars, or clothes, or food) and starts being just about how much you paid for it. Is a Manolo Blahnik stiletto an inherently better shoe than any other? No, yet otherwise intelligent women are prepared to go into debt to obtain them. People don't eat at The Palm because the food's any good. They eat there to be seen eating there. To these people, those products are worth the money.
But economies that can sustain restaurants serving $40 plates of food are fickle mistresses. Let their owners miss a few lease payments and we'll see how "top" they are.
As for pizza by the slice, the best slice in the world is the one you had as a kid. If that place is still around, go back and give it a try. I'll bet your memories of it are better than the pizza itself.
White truffle risotto is an example of a dish that should cost $115. White truffles are shockingly expensive.
Veal chop, not so much. But does anyone eat at Teatro on their own dime? Hard for me to imagine, and I sort of like the place...
Of course, at the end of the day they charge what the market will bear. All Washingtonians must unite against attempts to squeeze the upper middle class out of fine dining, if we ever want to see meaningful change.
That's a fantastic point. D.C. is often a town of Subway restaurants and take-outs on the one hand, and expensive dining on the other. There is too little in the middle.
I'd like to weigh in on the pizza comments, though I'm surprised that we're taking that turn in this post. I still haven't found a good pizza by the slice. Vace and Alberto's included. Apparently, New Yorker's can't find it, either. This is from the blog of the guy who wrote Pizza: the Ultimate Guide and Companion.
And, as much as I go out to eat, the only place I've had an over $40 entree was unwittingly, with friends, at Al Crostino -- truffle pasta $90. Ouch.
I think Via Cuccina does a pretty good pizza by the slice.
That's a funny comment about the pizza of your youth. I remember visiting DC as a kid in the 80's and waiting in line to eat at Geppetto's on M St. It was amazing. Up till about 2000 you could still get Geppetto's by walking down the alley next to its new incarnation Mendocino and picking up a phone and ordering. I tried that a few times, but you're right, it was never as good as my memory.
The only way I'm paying more than 30 bucks for an entre is if the service is top notch and the ambiance is perfect. Even if a panel of judges could determine what meal is "worth" 40 versus one "worth" 25, I'm sure I wouldn't have the taste buds to tell them apart.
I'd like to weigh in on the pizza comments, though I'm surprised that we're taking that turn in this post.
Why are you surprised? The lack of good pizza is a glaring absence in the DC food universe and something that oppresses me, depresses me, and crushes my soul every time I need a slice. I am dismayed that my daughter will probably grow up thinking that the red liquid sugar slathered on a mutant variety of oven-baked Wonder bread and topped with some sort of flavorless white "cheese" is what constitutes pizza.
Weighing in on the local restaurant comment: There are a lot more to add to your list, at least in my opinion: Ceiba, DC Coast, and PS7 just to name a few.
alberto's does a halfway decent slice, especially for the price, but dc's closest relative to actual ny pizza can be found at radius in mt pleasant.
If you are weighing in on the over $25 comment, Sam, Ceiba is mediocre at best, DC Coast is ok, but the quality of their food hardly warrants paying over 25 bucks, and PS 7 is one of the spottiest places ever.
I'll take that Wonderbread slop over what they're peddling at Ledos. Anybody want a Ritz cracker covered in catsup and smothered in white american cheese? Didn't think so.
There's no good slices because there's no working class Italian neighborhoods. Simple as that. DC suffers from the same fate as Manhattan: it's callled "the Ray's effect." Lousy slice joints like Jumbo Slice (the DC equivalent of Original Rays, Famous Rays, Ray Barri's, Fake Rays) peddling the same gummy slop.
What it comes down to is put up or shut up. People don't think twice about grilling their own hamburger; it probably tastes much better than the $12 version some white tablecloth joints sell downtown. Why not do the same with pizza? It isn't hard at all: flour, water, yeast, some good mozzarella, and a can of San Marzano tomatoes. And you don't have to be a total nutbar like this guy and hack your oven to get obscenely high pizza oven temperatures.
generally speaking, menu prices reflect a 25% to 29% food cost, which is the long established formula to maintain a profitable kitchen. If they are spending more, then a restaurant is losing money. If they are spending less, they are ripping off the customer. A $19 entree will have approximately $5-$6 worth of ingredients. A $40 entree will have approximately $11 worth of ingredients. The same rules apply to haute cuisine to your local pizza stand. This is not to say that a tasty meal cannot be made for $5 to $6 dollars using inexpensive ingredients, but there is a huge difference between a steak that costs a restaurant about 4 dollars and a piece of aged beef that costs a restaurant about 10 dollars. As with most things, you get what you pay for.
Monkey - The whole point of pizza for me is a cheap, quick, tasty, and convenient snack. If I have to fuck around with making my own dough then I can't really be bothered.
Yes, I realize this places me firmly in the camp of "whiny asshole who could do something about the problem but is too lazy".
Rat
There's an old engineering maxim that goes just as well for pizza: You can have it cheap, quick, or done right. Pick any two.
Or in the case of DC, try and pick one.
Then give up and get a $2 slice at Costco in Pentagon City.
On a related note, why is there no decent street food in Dupont Circle? It would be the perfect place to put a good slice joint. You could cater to the lunch crowd, dinner crowd, and late night crowd, with lots of people in a hurry who would pay a little extra for a really good slice. As it stands, I don't think there's anything other than BK and Julia's Empanadas. I guess the storefronts are too large to accommodate anything other than corporate yuckiness. Johnny Rockets, anyone?
Then give up and get a $2 slice at Costco in Pentagon City.
I'd rather have a gasoline and broken glass enema.
Monkey I usually settle for the Costco pizza too. At least I don't feel like I'm overpaying for what I get.
I'm sorry I made mention of pizza and turned this thread into another pizza discussion. But my point is that talking about $40 entrees seems really pointless. Expensive entrees are not hard to find, its the basics that are so lacking.
There is a place in Clinton (!) called Marghellina, that I tried once, and I'm due for another visit to get a 2nd opinion. Local trivia- the guy who owns and runs it was the first victim of the "snipers". Obviously he lived. Malvo and Muhammed used the money they stole from him to buy the Chevy Caprice that they used for their spree.
I'm simply baffled. You say that making your own pizza surely isn't that hard - but then link to a page that describes how a man has been working for 6 years to perfect his pizza recipe.
Okay, so maybe you don't have to work 6 years, but it is a feat to make good pizza at home. It's hard enough to make good pizza in a commercial kitchen. Just look at the comments above.
Then give up and get a $2 slice at Costco in Pentagon City.
I'd rather have a gasoline and broken glass enema.
I believe Unos is selling that under the name "Chicago Classic."
As for the lack of decent streetfood in Dupont, try "all of DC." My understanding is that street vending licenses and health codes are so restrictive, you're pretty much limited to hotdogs, eggrolls, and chips. Your best bet are the surreptitious burrito vans that linger around the various construction sites downtown.
The $40-a-plate issue just highlights the polarization of urban dining options: it's either expense account dining for lobbyists and lawyers or factory food like Subway. Downtown rents are such that mom-and-pops and greasy spoons are forced to make way for drab office cubes and yet another steakhouse that can't get their act together.
My understanding is that street vending licenses and health codes are so restrictive you're pretty much limited to hotdogs, eggrolls, and chips.
The reg does not limit the types of food that may be sold from a cart, imo. Two categories of items explicitly permitted to be sold from vending carts are "ready-to-eat food" and "prepackaged commercial food". The reg then lists examples of these categories, but I don't think it was meant to be an exclusive list (note: if it was, I'd like to have a word with whoever wrote the reg). The problem seems to be that DCRA isn't issuing any permits.
"The $40-a-plate issue just highlights the polarization of urban dining options: it's either expense account dining for lobbyists and lawyers or factory food like Subway."
I totally disagree. Plenty of that expense account dining is factory food too.
I totally disagree. Plenty of that expense account dining is factory food too.
Seems like a bit of red herring Reid. A gross oversimplification of the issue is that there are precious few dining options in DC between $40 entrees and corporate chain slop. The fact that there are lobbyists going to Applebee's is largely irrelevant to that point.
I didn't mean street carts, Monkey. You can't produce good pizza in a cart--you need a big ol' oven and at least five employees per square foot of kitchen. [The Original] Joe's comes to mind.
There are many places that serve good food for less than $25 per entree (that being my personal cringe point). Anything operated by Ann Cashion is a good bet. Such places generally are not on K Street, but they do exist in DC. And it's a lot harder to pay $40 for an entree in DC than NYC or SF, if only b/c restaurant rents are lower here.
You misunderstood my comment. I was making fun of the type of places a lot of lawyers and lobbyists go to as being no better than factory food. For every Citronnelle tab getting picked up by Law Firm X LLP, there's another three from places like Old Ebbit. Of course it's an exaggeration to call Old Ebbit factory food, but not by that much.
Perhaps I should rephrase my statement by saying "if you want a broad range of slop to choose from at various pricepoints, downtown DC has you covered."
Now, if you want a decent lunch for under $5 that won't have you grabbing both rails in the handicapped stall while remembering fondly your first mouthful of Olestra chips, your reverie punctuated by explosive "backfire" ...?
Perhaps I should rephrase my statement by saying "if you want a broad range of slop to choose from at various pricepoints, downtown DC has you covered."
Now, if you want a decent lunch for under $5 that won't have you grabbing both rails in the handicapped stall while remembering fondly your first mouthful of Olestra chips, your reverie punctuated by explosive "backfire" ...?
surreptitious burrito vans
anyone else ever go to the burrito van that used to be on h st at GW across from the library? that was the closest thing i have ever had to good street food in DC. they were cheap and fast and i liked them better than baja fresh. the van was always there in 2004 but seemed to disappear after that.
I was making fun of the type of places a lot of lawyers and lobbyists go to as being no better than factory food.
Gotcha, you won't get any argument from me on that.
Anyone who starts off their comment by disclosing the amount of money they spent on a meal in another city for the sake of showing off on to the internet is clearly a douche.
Secret good slices of pizza at the vegetarian friendly place behind Baja Fresh on H and 20th (?). Washington Deli? Dont know thew name. They are crisp and greasy -- what I consider philly style -- but, who knows what it really is. You can get meaty and delicious ones or you can get a fake meatball sandwich. The choice is never hard for me.