I grew up with a family of eight children and my Dad was a school teacher. Needless to say it seems like we were always on a budget. I’ve been thinking a lot about how I justify eating at really nice restaurants, coming from a very budget conscious mentality. I have a friend here in the city who told me he spends his money on three things:

1. Traveling
2. Art
3. Restaurants

He makes six figures (at least) and he spends all of his money on those three things. While I like all three of those things and a good chunk of our budget goest to all three of them, we prefer to save up for a house, etc. It was interesting to think about what kind of life we would lead if owning a house wasn’t a goal.

Before I moved to San Francisco, the nicest restaurant I had ever been to was the Metropolitan in SLC. For work and other things I’ve managed to hit a few upper-crust places while we’ve been here. But once a year we pick one to go to that we pay for ourselves. Two years ago: Michael Mina’s Last year: Fleur de Lys and this year: The French Laundry.

The French Laundry was named the best restaurant in the world several years in a row and it is nearly impossible to get in. You either have to know someone or know a trick. This site is dedicated to teaching how to get a reservation. Our anniversary isn’t for six more months but you have to call ahead four months.

It is a ridiculous amount of money to spend on food but we always have a really fun time. We eat a next-to-nothing lunch and then the meal usually consists of three hours straight of incredible food. By the end we are so stuffed we can hardly walk.