We paid $100 a person for one of Stephanie Izard’s “Wandering Goat” dinners here in Chicago (it was hosted at Art Smith’s home and I posted about it on here at the time.)
For a group dinner, I was part of a seven person group that had dinner at Fogo de Chao (Brazilian steakhouse chain) that ended up totalling $1,300 BEFORE the tip. The food portion of the bill was only about $350… Yeah, we were a little hungover the next morning.
Dinner at The French Laundry a few years ago; my husband, myself, and a few other Dopers.
Came to just over $300 per person. It was the best meal and experience I’ve ever had and completely worth it.
Around $175, though I didn’t pay for it. It was at a restaurant in a fancy hotel, and we were there for a college senior design project/graduation party. The host’s dad was one of the senior managers at the hotel, and he arranged the whole thing.
The serving sizes were very small, but there was like seven courses, so I still managed to be pretty full at the end. I was nervous the entire time of being kicked out for some breach of etiquette. “I’m sorry sir, but we don’t use that fork to eat our salad. I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”
About 20 Australian dollars.
Without alcohol, probably in the $150/person range. With alcohol, easily $250/person. Both numerous times, either on dates or business trips. A good dining experience is worth it.
It’s the wine that does it. Personal spending, around $200/plate, at Radius; I don’t recall the food being especially expensive, though. Expense account was something like $600/plate, Morton’s in NYC, and again it was the wine.
The price would be more reasonable, but the first was an anniversary dinner, and the wine was from the year we were married; the second was the very tail end of the bubble, working for an extravagant boss.
A couple times I’ve payed in the mid-$200s for two people (no alcohol) at some nice restaurants in SF.
The most I ever paid for just me was around $150–high end sushi bar in LA where I told the guy just to make me whatever he wanted.
$400 per person at Alinea in Chicago.
$375 per person at the French Laundry in California.
The most expensive I’ve ever paid for myself - probably about £200, in Paris. I dread to think what other people/their expense accounts have paid, though.
I did actually have a waiter leap forward once to say, “Not that fork, Madame!” This was a restaurant in Washington DC, one of the first snooty restaurants I’d ever been in. Embarrassing, but we laugh about it now.
Outside in, top down. What, were you raised in a barn or something? 
Luckily, the wife and I both prefer something other than wine with most of our fancy dinners, which keeps the costs managable. It’s the insane markup on vino that really launches the bill into the stratosphere.
You can take the girl out of the trailer park, but you can’t take the trailer park out of the girl! 
My share of dinner at Delmonico’s in Las Vegas for my buddy’s bachelor party was somewhere in the $140-$200 range, I don’t recall exactly. It was a very nice meal with wonderful service.
The guest of honor had been drinking at lunch, then had a few drinks before we went over to the restaurant, then had a drink or two while we were waiting to be seated, and some of the party split a bottle of wine during dinner. He was a very happy and well-behaved drunk who fell asleep at the table and I don’t think he got one bit of his steak into his mouth. It was hilarious. Everyone else enjoyed their dinners and desserts and some after-dinner chitchat and then we had to go.
As we carried him out the door he came to just in time to become sick in one of the big flower vases in front of the restaurant. At this point I experienced a wonderful level of service from the waitstaff. They looked over at us and I thought “That’s it, we’re getting ejected by security”. A waiter ran off and came back with a freshly laundered towel and a bottle of Perrier. I was apologizing and he didn’t bat an eye, just said “It’s no problem sir, this sort of thing happens all the time in Las Vegas”.
I managed to get a reference to that into my toast at his wedding which had all the groomsmen cracking up and everyone else very confused.
This. Though not with jjim 
That I paid for? A $650 meal for 3, split 2 ways. Two of us lost a bet to the 3rd and he got to choose the place. He chose Sushi of Gari, and we all had the omakase. It was so good so we just kept ordering and had 14 pieces each, even though the omakase stopped at 10. The bill didn’t include much drinking, only a beer each. But if you’re ever in NY, it’s spectacular and worth it. The original 78th St. location supposedly has the best chefs and fish, so we went there.
One time I went to McDonald’s even though I forgot my coupons…
I think a friend and I spent something like $300 between the two of us at Babbo’s in New York once, including wine and before-dinner drinks. That was a full five course meal–salad, pasta, meat, cheese, and dessert. Lovely, quite worth it in its way. Course, if I hadn’t had the disposable income at the time, it wouldn’t have been, but since I did, it was, if that makes any sense at all.
This. And it was worth every. Last. Dime.
The final tab, for the two of us, with wine and cocktails, was north of $300.
$800-900. Grad school visit at Harvard. Two guys took 4 potential grad students to dinner and were trying to rack up frequent flyer miles. It was unreal (I am still curious how they knew they were going to be paid back for the bill.) and extremely good, but I was so blitzed I don’t remember much of the food at all. We were there hours and hours (I do remember that we each had 3 desert courses) and crazy mixed drinks to start and bottles of port afterward.
I sat waiting for you for hours. 
Did you enjoy it as much as I did? Did you spend as much? My bill, by the way, included one beer, one kir royale, and only half a bottle of wine.