My French Laundry experience was also remarkable, and the tab a bit less than $500, but not by much. I don't find that a "flaw" as such since we both left feeling like we had gotten good value for the money. Did we eat $500 worth of food - of course not - but the entire experience was perfect, professional without being stuffy, their main goal seemed to be to figure out where each customer's head was at and to adjust their service to reflect that. We were in the middle of a very relaxing wine weekend and our service was equally relaxed. An ajoining table was pretty clearly occupied by a group where the host was "showing off", and their service was much more formal and restrained.

We got a great night's entertainment for what actually wasn't that much more than a show combined with a much more ordinary meal.