Extortionate eating
THROUGHOUT September, the postbag has been bulging with stories of restaurant rip-offs. France (home of the pounds 2 spoonful of jam reported in these pages on 10 September) features heavily: Sue Klein of Bexhill in Sussex nominates a cafe at the Mont St Michel as home of the world's most expensive breakfast: pounds 22 for two coffees, two glasses of milk (at pounds 1.90 each) and eight (cold) croissants.
The winner, however, is Elizabeth Ribchester, of Aberdour in Fife, who found the charges at the Marhold Restaurant in Vienna decidedly eccentric. When she dined at this restaurant in the Austrian capital a couple of weeks ago, her bill contained two unidentified sums of 8 Schillings (about 50p). It transpired that one was for 'a bread roll which we had not ordered but which nevertheless was on the table'. The other charge was for 'use of textile napkin'. A jar of confiture (street value pounds 250, according to some Parisian restaurateurs) is on its way to Fife.
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