So, I guess the lesson of this weekend is that I’m not nearly as clever as I think I am. Well, I guess that’s the lesson of just about every day, but you know…this weekend was just the freshest example of it.
The reason? I got totally suckered by a restaurant that sneakily managed to sell me a R270 bottle of wine that I could’ve bought at Spar for R80. Needless to say I was gutted, mostly because it was my own stupidity that landed me with a bill that was almost R300 heftier than I thought it was going to be.
The wine in question was the 2007 Diemersfontein Pinotage, a bottle of red that’s been causing a ridiculous fuss ever since it landed in the top three of just about every “Top Wine List” you can get your hands on. And due to the fact that, for such a celebrated wine, it was reasonably priced (as well as freakin delicious) it was about as madly popular as an IPL cheerleader at a naked foam party. I’d ordered it at this particular restaurant before and even then they charged a hefty R160 for the pleasure of drinking it within their four walls, but you know, I get it. Restaurants need to make money too, and they sure as hell don’t make it from shifting pizzas. So, we were in the mood to celebrate (and my dad had offered to pick up the tab – score) and so I decided to splash out and ordered it without looking at the wine list.
Dammit. Dammit dammit dammit.
Two hours later I almost swallowed my own face when the bill came up and discovered that (in the space of two months) they’d hiked the already fat price by over R100.
Bollocks. Bollocks bollocks bollocks.
So, needless to say I shelled up the cash (I couldn’t bring myself to foist the tab on my poor dad), all the while cursing my idiocy for not checking the crapping price. But, in my own defense – who the fuck raises the charge of a bottle of wine by R100 between March and June? Well, these guys apparently.
And this isn’t the first time it’s happened either. At another establishment the previous year, the sommelier tried to sell us a R350 bottle of wine as a replacement for the R80 bottle we’d been drinking earlier, which they’d run out of. It was only because I was with someone far smarter than me (not difficult) who asked how much it was before blithely giving the thumbs up.
A bullet dodged on that occasion. But the point is that I understand you need to make money from alcohol, but please rip me off to my face, not by slipping retardedly overpriced wine onto my bill. I’ll pay it, because I’m spineless, but I’m not going to be happy about it. And next time I’ll bloody bring my own bottle that I bought at Spar for a third of the price.
The FoodHall 