Eat out for less

by Ally Hunt on 04 August 2009  |  0 comments
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Careful use of discount vouchers means even frugal families can afford to eat out!

I don't know about you but the recession is certainly taking its toll in my house. But it was my birthday recently and as a treat we decided we'd all go out for dinner at the weekend - we just needed to keep it quite cheap!

I quite fancied pizza, so we took a look at "Frugal Food" to see if any relevant restaurants had any vouchers. Unbelievably, there are no vouchers around for Pizza Express at the moment, but fortunately Strada had a "Buy one get one free" offer on main courses (cheapest one free).

The only problem was it was only valid Sun-Fri, and we'd obviously prefer a Saturday. But in the end we decided we'd go at 5pm on Sunday. So I dutifully signed up, printed the voucher and off we headed.

So what did we have? Well we brought some food for our 1-year-old son (who has no patience) and our 3-year-old daughter ordered the chicken (half a chicken breast with roast potatoes, green beans and a cherry tomato sauce). That, with an apple juice and ice cream was a reasonable £4.50 from the kids menu.

My husband and I had garlic and rosemary bread (£3.65) followed by a rustica pizza for me (£8.95) and a seafood risotto for him (£10.50). Add to that a couple of Peronis for him (£2.95 each) and a sparkling water for me (£1.95) (complimentary filtered water also arrived).

The food was fantastic - my son munched on pizza with me and my daughter amazed us by polishing off her huge portions, and then asking for some of ours! The kids also got colouring books and crayons (which very obliging waitresses constantly picked up off the floor!).

And although disappointingly we couldn't stay for dessert (my son was getting bored and had started "quacking" at other diners very loudly) we were stuffed and the bill arrived for £35.45 - but just £26.50 after we'd used the voucher (my main course was free). Bargain!

I'd therefore say if you fancy a meal out don't feel tied to popular days, particularly if there's a voucher floating about that can be used Sun-Thurs. If you've got kids, especially, eating out at less popular times means restaurants are less busy (so you get better service) food arrives more promptly and a free main course is always a good thing!