I was one of the first in the original thread to express shock at the idea of a 20-pound breakfast (sorry, American on an American keyboard, dunno how to make the GBP sign).

But I'd like to clarify something - It's not the fact that it's breakfast that threw me off; it's just that 20 quid is a very expensive meal, be it B, L, or D.

However, a gourmet meal, made in a 5-star restaurant by a master chef, is certainly worth more money than a mass-produced meal in a chain restaurant. Had I the means, I would certainly enjoy such meals on a regular basis, but as a middle-class working stiff, I cannot justify the expense of such indulgences, when I can get an acceptable (though inferior) meal for less than 1/4 of the price.

I have never had a problem with the concept of pay more, get more. So long as I am getting value for my money, either in larger quantities or higher qualities, or some other added factor like ambience, location, some sort of show, or an unusual level of service, it seems perfectly reasonable to me to spend more money when it's within one's budget.

If I'm ever in London, and my budget can handle it, I might consider laying down a twenty for breakfast at Simpons on the Strand. Assuming, of course, that they'd be willing to admit an uncultured Yank such as myself.

in the 5* french and italian hotels breakfast is at least 50 euro, on the way to 60. i have seen people "pop" in, get a coffee, and go. 50 euro!!!

No kidding, outrageous hotel breakfast charges are out of control right now. Just checked one place I stay frequently and the price with breakfast is $42 more.

And at the other end of the spectrum are the high-end four and five star Asian hotels where a breakfast (particularly a buffet) can be a phenomenal value for what is offered.

Given the GBP#1 is equivalent to US$1 in costs on the ground there, it doesn't seem that expensive in that sense; I've had plenty of $20 lunches at nicer places. $32 USD (errr, $30.32 per google... dang, time to visit the UK again) is a pricier meal, but I've had plenty of casual dining meals where my share was about that after tax and tip, and that's often less than an entree at fancier places (before drinks, share of an appetizer if any, and the tendency of fine dining to make sides separate, let alone tax and tip)... almost always for places by good beef.

See, I can't see for breakfast what a master chef can add. For meals where I'd be more inclined to try interesting and different food, sure. For one of the same handful of breakfast orders where I want them the way I want them, rather than a chef's vision of them, paying for a fancy place and a master chef is rather likely to eff them up.

Same reason why I don't eat mac'n'cheese at any restaurant (I'm sorry, I've got a recipe for doing it at home that suits my tastes exactly and is dead easy) and I no longer eat hamburgers at any fancified restaurant which tries to charge more for them a regular burger joint; anything they could do to justify the higher price almost certainly consists of effing-it-up.

Lunch or dinner there looks much more interesting, IMO.

I've seen a couple of posts mentioning equivalency between pounds and dollars, but I'm not sure I understand.

At today's exchange rate, 1 pound is equal to $1.51. 20 pounds, then, is $30.18, which is a lot of money for a meal. I've spent that much on meals before, but I still consider it a lot, at least by my standards.

As to "effing" things up, well, if that's the way you feel about world-class chefs, that's your opinion. I have never personally eaten food prepared by one of those guys, but I have eaten at enough cheap places, chain restaurants, and mid-level restaurants to know that there is a difference in the quality of the food as you go from one level to another. A burger at G&M Seafood near BWI is going to beat the socks off a burger from the neighborhood sub shop down the street, and I don't doubt for a moment that a burger from one of the better restaurants in New York or even London will beat G&M.

Nothing beats G&M's Maryland style crab cakes, though. Nobody outside Maryland does maryland style foods right, except the rare Maryland transplant.

If I go out for dinner by myself, in a standard generic chain pizza place, I'd be really unlikely to get of there with a bill less than �15. We went out for breakfast/brunch recently in a nicer end restaurant in Edinburgh, and I think we were just under �15 a head. At Little Chef - the closest thing we have to Denny's - we'd be about �10. Hence why the comparison that �1 = $1 The exchange rate has nothing to do with it, eating out is more expensive in the UK such that every �1 spent on food in the UK is the equivalent of $1 spent in the US.

So �20 for breakfast in a well known relatively high end restaurant, if they are using prime ingredients is not too much of a stretch in the UK. I do think that that �5 extra is about the restaurant name though, but if you are prepared to pay it, you are prepared to pay it.

At the other end of the scale are the �20 generic chain hotel breakfasts. Buffet breakfasts with a buffet full of poor quality items - which in fairness are usually not cooked too badly, but where the bacon, black pudding and sausage is poor quality nasty rubbish (still edible and enjoyable though ) the mushrooms are tinned, the scrambled eggs are powdered, and the hash browns are frozen. Toast comes out of one of those awful machines where you have to hover to get them out at the other end, the butter is rock solid and the bread for the toast is the cheapest sliced cotton wool bread imaginable. The choice of fruit juice selection is orange or apple, and the glasses are the smallest thimbles in the world.

Those places are hell. You only eat there if it's included in the price, or you are hungover.

I wouldn't call a place like that hell, and I've certainly eaten comparable breakfasts in the cheaper US hotel chains (when they were included in the price of the room), but there's no way I'd pay 20 bucks for one. It's edible, sometimes it's even enjoyable, but there's no way it's worth 20 bucks.

By the way, what's black pudding?

ahhhh ahhhhh full scottish breakfast i see! I wouldnt mind one once in a blue moon, yes its a lot of money; but given that it's Strand (let's compare it to 5th Ave, NYC) using real ingredients (Yes cumberland sausages and proper eggs and bacon I'm pointing at you) - fair deal.

I skip breakfast all the time (or eat sth hardly substantial) but compared to a full brunch buffet in 5* asian hotels as noted, I'd rather get this!

and yes, organic/free-range food do taste different - whether or not you can do it depends on your taste buds and the cooking. a good friend of mine sheepishly admitted to that after being presented with the top produce cooked right after saying it's nonsense for 2-3 years.

My experience visiting the UK (a frequent visitor 10-12 years ago, and an infrequent one since) is that "assume prices there are the same as in a similar part of the US, if you just substitute GBP for USD" is a safe rule of thumb to avoid either sticker shock or over-paying.

It depends very much on the dish; there are things where innovation is welcome, and there are foods I want to be cooked competently to my own specification, and innovation is decidedly not welcome. In many cases, you pay a world-class chef for the innovation, not just the execution.

Sure, although it rarely correlates exactly with cost; I'll put a $7 (sans sides) burger at the best of my local places (Jeffrey's in San Mateo -- they have another one in Menlo Park) against any burger at any price anywhere. Just about ANY local burger place will beat the pants off of the $10 burgers at any of the mid-price casual chain places (Outback, TGIF, Chilis.)

Further, for some foods, "better ingredients" isn't always better. I've had a several burgers made with wagyu (including in Japan -- all except the first on someone else's dime)...which I love for things it's appropriate for. It's an AWFUL beef to use for a burger; it's not firm enough, and too fatty -- you lose most of the flavor benefits of the wagyu if you cook it well done (not an option where I had it in Japan, not speaking the language and not wanting to ask my host to translate) and when I didn't (either with the language barrier or because I was told "the reason it was bad last time was you got it well done" here)... you've got an underdone and mushy burger.

Whenever I've had a burger at a place like that, the burden of having to justify the $15-$20 price for a burger had entailed elaborations that leave the burger ruined, rather than improved. Could be wrong about that being a general trend, but it's been my experience.

I find it hilarious that the British FTers are purporting that good food is worth the $.

While I have not eaten at a Gordon Ramsay restaurant or other Michelin starred restaurants in the UK, besides eating in parts of Africa, the UK has had the worst food I have ever eaten.

1. Perhaps the British are concerned about the safety of meat after BSE?
2. While this thread talks about specific sausages, England is famous for the banger which is also famous for being filled with low quality meat and other fillers. If the UK FTers want to paint cheap US breakfasts with a broad brush, why couldn't an American paint a British sausage with a similarly broad brush?
3. Great chefs have two undeniable qualities...great technical skill and a strong ability to manage the kitchen. However, in 2013, most "foodies" would say that a great chef needs to be able to either meld new ingredients or old ingredients in a new way and (often) to use newer cooking techniques. The "great breakfasts" described here seem to have better quality ingredients cooked in traditional ways. Unless you are a real breakfast aficionado, isn't your money better spent getting a lunch or dinner cooked technically well and you get to taste something new as well? Many high-end modern dishes require multiple smaller "dishes" to be made and assembled just perfectly. The English Breakfast...not.

I might not be completely understanding your language regarding speed of cooking but you seem to imply that the laws of physics (heat transfer) are violated when SaMo Farmer's Market eggs are cooked on your stove.

The eggs cook in seconds? Perhaps 180 seconds when the eggs from Ralphs cook in 180.1 seconds?

Wow, arrogant much?

Next time you come to the UK, why don't you drop by the UK& Ireland forum to get some decent suggestions? Tourists all too often stick to tourist traps where the food is very often rubbish because they don't know any better about where to find good food.

It seems that maybe I touched a nerve?

What is arrogant about my post? I merely refuted assertions made by you and Showbizguru.

Please factually refute my assertions rather than making derisive comments about me ("arrogant").

I could have said, "What cares what a Brit thinks about food?"...that would have been arrogant and argumentative but I did not.

Yet no such reply to the OP, who's trying to tell us silly Americans what is or is not a good breakfast, and that what we have is not bacon?