The likeliest scenario I can think of, which you refer to as a 'curve' and the everyday restaurant, could be public restaurants. i.e. a modern interpretation, which is being trialled right now, of the British Restaurants of the 1940s and Civic Resturants up to the '70s. See also The Long Table, albeit a slightly different model.
I love the idea of The Long Table and I hope it works. The ‘pay what you can’ policy is a massive risk open to the obvious abuses from twats. Maybe it’s perfect for Stroud but less so for Soho. 🤘
I've run a pay what you can restaurant pilot model and while yes we've seen a little bit of taking the mickey, on the whole the model deployed as is (Long Table included) can only be reliant on grant subsidy in some way or another anyway. We are in the process of tweaking it to help alleviate some of the issues (i.e. controlled number of concessions), so I hope I'm wrong
Having landed in London in the last few days I am again calibrating to UK prices. I'm setting up a lot of lunches not dinner. A friend (truffle dealer) I went to noma with last year said let's do the lunch at Anglothai. It's just £65, which is about $130 but in reality much more with wine and service. Still cheaper than where we usually end up. I wonder, is this all analogous to theatre. Scouting around for tickets I saw Inter Alia at the NT was about $600. I'm sure there's cheaper and I may have being scalped but it's the once a year or two thing. And then Friday night I was in the City at Le Relais de Venise L'Entrecôte on Throgmorton Street. Packed out with, I'd say, diners 35 year old and around. I was way older by far. Maybe the young crave the simplicity, the lack of choice, an element of nostalgia (for a dining culture on the other end of the tunnel) and not getting stung.
Anyone eating in Throgmorton Street on a Friday night is way above this conversation. They certainly won’t be among those struggling to pay their rent.
Well, not from what I saw and heard. The thing about Le Relais de Venise L'Entrecôte is that for just over £40 you got steak frites and half a bottle of wine. That's why it was packed. Not everyone working in the City is loaded, and most of the younger patrons would no doubt be shouldering student debt (not a thing in my day).
I’m so old I can remember when the Berni Inn was a treat when we’d scraped up enough to pay the mortgage. Beware nostalgia!
The likeliest scenario I can think of, which you refer to as a 'curve' and the everyday restaurant, could be public restaurants. i.e. a modern interpretation, which is being trialled right now, of the British Restaurants of the 1940s and Civic Resturants up to the '70s. See also The Long Table, albeit a slightly different model.
I love the idea of The Long Table and I hope it works. The ‘pay what you can’ policy is a massive risk open to the obvious abuses from twats. Maybe it’s perfect for Stroud but less so for Soho. 🤘
I've run a pay what you can restaurant pilot model and while yes we've seen a little bit of taking the mickey, on the whole the model deployed as is (Long Table included) can only be reliant on grant subsidy in some way or another anyway. We are in the process of tweaking it to help alleviate some of the issues (i.e. controlled number of concessions), so I hope I'm wrong
Good luck with it Hugh. Let me know where you are and I’ll pop in and pay full price.
https://www.fromefoodnetwork.co.uk/canteen
Having landed in London in the last few days I am again calibrating to UK prices. I'm setting up a lot of lunches not dinner. A friend (truffle dealer) I went to noma with last year said let's do the lunch at Anglothai. It's just £65, which is about $130 but in reality much more with wine and service. Still cheaper than where we usually end up. I wonder, is this all analogous to theatre. Scouting around for tickets I saw Inter Alia at the NT was about $600. I'm sure there's cheaper and I may have being scalped but it's the once a year or two thing. And then Friday night I was in the City at Le Relais de Venise L'Entrecôte on Throgmorton Street. Packed out with, I'd say, diners 35 year old and around. I was way older by far. Maybe the young crave the simplicity, the lack of choice, an element of nostalgia (for a dining culture on the other end of the tunnel) and not getting stung.
Anyone eating in Throgmorton Street on a Friday night is way above this conversation. They certainly won’t be among those struggling to pay their rent.
Well, not from what I saw and heard. The thing about Le Relais de Venise L'Entrecôte is that for just over £40 you got steak frites and half a bottle of wine. That's why it was packed. Not everyone working in the City is loaded, and most of the younger patrons would no doubt be shouldering student debt (not a thing in my day).