Diners fizz with fury as top chefs charge over the odds for champagne

Are top restaurants charging over the odds for champers?

Award-winning venues such as Heston Blumenthal's The Fat Duck and Raymond Blanc's Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons have been criticised by a food and drink writer for charging "hideous" amounts for vintage champagnes and almost three times the retail cost of non-vintage fizz.

Martin Isark, author of The Supermarket Own Brand Guide: Choosing The Best Value Food And Drink, said: "In some of the poshest restaurants, champagne has become far too expensive.

"It's hideous and you also create this extraordinary, unexplained variation between restaurants that offer the same quality dining experience."

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Mr Isark, who carried out the research into champagne and wine costs in restaurants across the country, added: "What surprised is a restaurant such as The Ivy, which really could trade on its name and clientele, sold vintage champagne at one of the lowest prices, with its Taittinger available at £90.

"However, a restaurant such as the Savoy Grill nearby sells it for twice as much and Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons sells it for £255.

"There's no doubt that great food enhances the pleasure of drinking wine and champagne but it can sour when you realise that a restaurant down the road of similar quality is selling it hundreds and sometimes thousands of pounds cheaper."

A trawl of the prices at a number of the most fêted places in the country found the same bottle of non-vintage Bollinger champagne could vary from £55 - Ransomes Dock in London - to £90 - both Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons in Oxfordshire and The Fat Duck in Bray.

On the high street at Majestic it costs less than £27.

Vintage champagne has an even bigger price differential.

Again, the most expensive is at Le Manoir at a staggering £255 for a 1995 Taittinger but only £145 at Kettners in London.

Mr Isark said: "The cannier restaurant owners buy wine and champagne early and then sit on them for a few years, before charging prices that will give them a healthy profit but not rip off their customers.

"My advice to diners is that they should check the restaurant's website first and take a look at the wine list, or if the wine list is not on the website, ask the restaurant to send one."

The research found similar variations in the cost of wine.

A 1997 Le Montrachet is considered to be among the best white wines in the world and would cost about £1,750 from a wine dealer. But it is on sale for £1,490 at The Square in Mayfair and for more than three times that at The Waterside Inn in Bray.