We all like to enjoy good food, but just how much would you be willing to spend to satisfy your palate? If money is no object, or you are willing to take out a bank loan for a tasty meal, you might like to sample one the five most expensive dishes ever created.
There is always room for desert, especially when that desert can be enjoyed in the surrounding of the beautiful Fortress Resort and Spa in Sri Lanka. However, at $14,500 (£8,851), the Fortress Stilt Fisherman Indulge Desert is probably one that would not want to charge to the room. Made with gold leaf Italian cassata, Irish cream, and Dom Perignon champagne sabayon, this fruit compote is topped off with a chocolate-carved Stilt fisherman and is certainly one for those who enjoy the finer things in life. While the Dom Perignon and hand-carved chocolate are certainly worthy of a premium price tag, what really bumps the price up here is the addition of an 80-carat Aquamarine gemstone, which I’m assuming is not edible!
Brit’s love a good old steak pie, but whether any of us would be willing to pay £7,600 ($12,500) for one though is a different story. Chef Spencer Burge of the Fence Gate Inn in Burnley is the man responsible for the luxury pie and justified its price tag by including Wagyu beef, matsutake mushrooms, black truffles, and two £4,100 bottles of Chateau Mouton Rothschild among the ingredients.
Back in 2011, Marc Guibert, head chef at the Lindeth Howe Country House Hotel in the Lake District, came up with the ultimate chocolate pudding – a £22,000, champagne jelly layered, edible gold laced egg-shaped extravaganza. The exclusive pudding is made to order, with two-week’s notice required for the chef to prepare the meal for dessert lovers. Needless to say, the desert is not a big seller. In fact, according to Eater, only one pudding has ever been sold.
Burger lovers were given a rare treat earlier this year when scientists in the Netherlands introduced a burger made entirely from meat grown in a lab. Professor Mark Post from Maastricht University and his team of burger lovers used stem cells to develop 20,000 strips of meat – a process that will mean generations of burger eaters long after meat from animals has run out. Colouring was added to the meat in the form of beetroot and saffron, with £250,000 suggested as the recommended retail price. Eating out is going to be really expensive in the future!
I think we can all agree that £250,000 is ridiculously steep for a burger, but the cost of stem cell meat in a bun, even when combined with every other meal on the list, does not come close to the price of the world’s most expensive meal – the Strawberries Arnaud Dessert. The post-main meal delight is the signature desert of the world renowned Arnaud’s in New Orleans and consists of strawberries in marinade port, red wine, spices, citrus and vanilla ice cream. Arnaud’s then throw in a 7.09-carat pink diamond and give the desert a whopping $3.95 million (£2.4 million) price tag. The owners say that the desert is the restaurant’s worst seller – I wonder why?