Fine Dining…..thoughts?

What I don’t like is eating out and being served a meal that is worse than I could cook myself, and drinking wine at £25 a bottle that is £6 in the shops. For a man I’m a decent cook and we use mostly home grown fruit and veg, my wife is more adventurous cooking. We don’t eat out often, we invite friends to ours, it’s just what we enjoy doing.

Fine dining is about being seen at a certain restaurant, name dropping how nice it is, or being angry about an empty plate.
Take your pick!.

I think my budget would find Fine Dining a bit overwhelming, and my stomach would find it underwhelming, by the sound of it.

Joseann

^DD’s partner is a high-end event chef & I’ve seen the effort & time that goes into fine dining & don’t begrudge the cost^.

I agree with this comment.
Fine dining isn't about a few fancy leaves arranged on a plate, or a few blobs of sauce. It's about the provenance of the food and the passion of the chef. I was lucky enough to eat at fine dining restaurants (London) regularly, some better than others. My favourite was Monica Galetti's, Mere in Fitzrovia, where as special guests, she explained her ideas and ethos on fine dining. Coupled with the knowledge of her lovely French husband, David, as sommelier, it was a very interesting evening. (She also gave us a tour of the sparkling kitchens afterwards, and we helped her load her car at midnight with all the "leftovers" she took home to practise with). Fine dining might not be to everyone's taste, but it is exciting.

Sorry, I'm having a reminiscing moment!

Fantastic, love Monica although never had the pleasure but I think DD & partner have.

I enjoy the odd ‘fine dining’ experience as it’s not only the food (fingers crossed it’s good) it’s the surroundings and hopefully, the elegance. Now and again I like something out of the ordinary and to use a cheesy expression “making memories”.

Fed up with minimalist restaurants, plain plain plain, give me some bling and rococo, some theatrically.😁

Absolutely hate taster menus, what on earth is this horror thrust upon us? Just give a good straightforward starter, mains and pudding please.

I totally agree hollysteers it is as much about the experience and surroundings as it is about the food. It is lovely to do something like this for a special occasion. No I don't like taster menus either starter, mains and pudding for me to!

I don't know why some people are sneery about "fine dining".

I agree the title is a bit odd but surely it's not the restaurants that are labelling it that?
I could be wrong.

Food that is unusual (to me) prepared in a way I wouldn't bother with at home, by people of exceptional talent is definitely a treat I can enjoy.

Well said, NotSpaghetti. It's not just about top quality food, but often more about a restaurant's uniqueness.
Fine dining isnt a helpful description, but I guess we're all just using the expression here so everyone sort of understands. Elegant is another word people often use.
If anyone is interested in sampling what these restaurants offer, then Taste of London in Regents Park is worth a visit. You queue up at individual stalls, (which are like mini kitchens), and you are able to order small portions of different menu choices. It's a bit more boozy now than in the early days, but a good way to spend a summer's evening. Don't forget the Laurent Perrier champagne closure! 🍾

enclosure!

Recently treated to a six course taster menu with wine pairing. Lovely but..... whoever drinks six glasses (albeit slightly smaller) at one meal? Certainly not me. They were lined up and happily offered to the rest of the party. Not sure it is clever to encourage such drinking practices. But...hey.....that's for individuals to decide. Certainly makes a financial killing for the establishments indulging.

The day we moved in to our new house we were so exhausted we decided to just go to a nearby restaurant for a quick meal. We did change but most of our clothes were packed up so we were clean but dressed up. When we got there it was a tiny place, just one room, quite dark walls, not much light. No other customers. It took 45 minutes for our meals to reach us and they were delivered on huge silver platters. The waiters stood behind us and raised the tops off the platters in unison to show us our meals. We were a bit gobsmacked at all the theatre.

The meals were nice but tiny and we had to wait another 30 minutes for our desserts. The meals were nice but tiny, we were still hungry when we left and had chips on the way home. That was about 35 years ago and it cost us over £80. We never went back and do wonder how long they survived.

You can’t beat fish and chips. Our local chippy fries fish to order - there’s always a queue there. Their home made cheese and onion pie is exquisite! 😋
We’ve just returned from a cruise - we could have paid extra for speciality dining, but the prices were ridiculous! Probably tiny portions too, but at least on ship there are other options if you’re still peckish! 😂

As a pensioner on a very limited budget, fine dining is not on my horizon but do love good food of all kinds. So the way I do things is that I always carry in the car , a childs lunchbox with all cutlery, bottle openers etc etc. I have plates dishes , kitchen roll condiments etc. If I am going out with a friend or alone for the day I sometimes go to Tesco and buy their meal deal, so prawn sandwich , mango or pineapple , and fruit drink. They are my basic. So if I find a lovely view or place on the moors I can sit there and eat the food I have brought and I also always take my cafetiere , china mugs etc to make my lovely fresh coffee. So can be miles from anywhere and have no need to go to a town to get something to eat. If we end up at the coast, there may be a good fish and chip shop or in another town a good chinese takeaway. Whatever appeals we can buy at take away prices, then go and find the place we want to stop in and have our al fresco meal. One day it was miserable weather until about 5pm when the sky cleared and it was a beautiful evening. So we didnt dash home but sat watching the sea and then later got a chinese and went up on the moors and sat under the stars enjoying our meal. Each to their own, but I have had many enjoyable meals in this way. I know it is not "fine dining" but a) couldnt possibly afford the price of a fine dining and b) I am yorkshire and would be horrified to pay a high price and not leave feeling full of good food!!

madeleine45 - lots of us like picnics. That's probably a certainty!

I woild not think of a meal-deal the way you do though. They are emergency eating if stuck out somewhere for me. The last one was when I pulled over into a motorway service station when the rain was blinding.

The complexity of sharing a Chinese take-away in the car or picnic-style would defeat me I'm afraid.

I suppose the good thing is that we can all find food we enjoy.
I do wish there were better "eating out" options near my home though!

For me it is a question of good quality ingredients well cooked. That can be the really exceptional Cornish pasty I had at a National Trust property in Somerset recently, to fish and chips, from a really good chippy to the Spanish resturant we ate in yesterday when the French restaurant we intended to nip into for lunch turned out to be shut for a private booking

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I just love all the descriptions they use: We had pig's cheek as a speciality in a very upmarket restaurant where I live. Other words included veloute, jus, coulis, bavarois & arancini. Fascinating!

I had it in mind that ‘fine dining’ was an American term, maybe because I first saw it in the US. I thought it just meant a non ‘burgers, chicken, ribs’ sort of establishment.

I’ve experienced two ‘tasting menus’, both in France, and let’s just say that I’ve had much more enjoyable meals in France for about a quarter of the price.

A tasting menu always sounds to me like a sit down buffet, with the food brought to you instead of wandering along a table taking small portions of the dishes that appeal to you.

Tuaim

I just love all the descriptions they use: We had pig's cheek as a speciality in a very upmarket restaurant where I live. Other words included veloute, jus, coulis, bavarois & arancini. Fascinating!

I don't know how much you paid for the pig's cheeks but back in the day this was poor person's food. Now you pay a premium for it and I can't help but think they dress it up with fancy names and you're eating offal!
It's all about the profit...

Is it though, keepingquiet?
Or is it about someone's passion?

NotSpaghetti

Is it though, keepingquiet?
Or is it about someone's passion?

If it were just passion would they be charging so much money?

It's labour mainly I think, keepingquiet and high quality local produce.

My favourite restaurant has its own garden and herb greenhouse, makes its own cordials, grows its own chickens etc. These need tending as well as planning and maintaining.

There were 30 people at my mother-in-law's 100th birthday. They had 12-15 people working from morning to 5pm(ish).
We had 3 courses and three "extras". We had vegetarians, vegans, gluten free and omnivores.
We had two meetings to sort out a menu and several emails/phone conversations. We had a wine "tasting" too.

I know this was an "event" but care takes time.
It was cheaper than "wedding" prices, for sure.

Most people on here have their own home and pay the bills needed to maintain it, rates, energy, insurance maintenance. If you do any cooking it will be in a kitchen where at sometime upi haave probably bought the cooker, fridge, air fryer, utensils etc etc. But when you prepare a meal you think only of what you spent on the food and your time.

A restaurant is no different from a home, there are premises to pay for rates, energy inssurance, standards of hygiene ets to meet, staff to employ furnishings and cleaning, kitchen equipment and every thing else, plus, of course, the cooking ingredients, which in a good restaurant will be of the highest quality

It is not surprising that quite simple dishes, when served in a top restaurant in an area where rents etc are high will be expensive. They will have more staff, higher maintenance costs, better trained staff and more expensive fittings.

Surely the highesst judgement of a chef is that he can take any ingredient, including, one, that in the past as been on a poor man's plate and make it something sublime.

Our local top of the range restaurant in France has served, in his case, beef cheek, and it is out of this world delicious, the way he cooks it, the herbs and extra he adds. I have tried to do it at home and it was nice enough, but I cannot match the flavour and tenderness it has when cooked by a top chef.

I will willingly pay the prices on his menu because he serves food that no one but a very skilled and inspired chef can provide, day after day, year after year.

Tuaim

I just love all the descriptions they use: We had pig's cheek as a speciality in a very upmarket restaurant where I live. Other words included veloute, jus, coulis, bavarois & arancini. Fascinating!

Arancini was peasant food, last nights left over risotto rolled in a ball, dipped in bread crumbs and deep fried.
It’s a common dish on Italian menus, it’s delicious.

keepingquiet

Tuaim

I just love all the descriptions they use: We had pig's cheek as a speciality in a very upmarket restaurant where I live. Other words included veloute, jus, coulis, bavarois & arancini. Fascinating!

I don't know how much you paid for the pig's cheeks but back in the day this was poor person's food. Now you pay a premium for it and I can't help but think they dress it up with fancy names and you're eating offal!
It's all about the profit...

I remember seeing Bath Chaps (pigs’ cheeks) in U.K. supermarkets years ago, in the cold meats section. I dont recall my mother ever buying them, though.

As for ‘poor people’s food’, oysters were described as such in Dickens’ Pickwick Papers. IIRC, ‘It’s a werry remarkable circumstance, how oysters and poverty go together.’ (Sam Weller?).

Re offal again, an elderly Yorkshire landlady when I was a student in the late 60s, who told me her family had been very poor when she was a child, once gave me some cold meat that looked a bit like tongue, but paler. I wasn’t keen on tongue, but ate it anyway.
‘Do you like that, love?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ I lied politely. ‘What is it?’
‘Udder.’ 😱