Food budget?
 

Hi, what would you think is an average food budget per day, family of four for a four week holiday throughout Italy. Would be a real mix of light meals, quick meals and lovely local restaurants. Just trying to get a realistic cost of our trip. What did you end up spending on average?

ooh, big question.

a lot of variables here - age of kids, whether alcohol is drunk [can make it cheaper as those cokes and fruit juices soon add up] your travelling style, whether you are staying in hotels or apartments......

perhaps the best I can do is to tell you about the approx cost of a few trips we did with our almost adult kids to Rome, Florence and Venice [cheapest to dearest].

Breakfast [eaten out] - approx €5 pp for a hot drink, cornetto and a fruit juice.

Lunch [lighter meal but we like to sit down to regroup for a longer afternoon than we would manage if we just ate on the hoof] - pizza or salad pp plus a drink - say €10 pp.

Dinner [usually 3 courses plus wine and water] - say €25 pp.

then there's the odd beer or spremuta [that's freshly squeezed orange or lemon juice - can be €2.50 or €6 depending on where you are - i paid both in florence last year] and gelato - say 1 per day - that's another €10 pp.

grand daily total pp - €50.

are you staying in hotels or apartments?
are the kids toddlers or teenagers?
are any meals included in your accommodations?

PS - i suspect the longer you stay, the lower your costs will be - IME eating out begins to pall after a while. that's when apartments come into their own.

Ok, kids are 19 & 17' staying in apartments won't be cooking too much, some place have breakfast most don't. We will drinking with dinners. Day time will be eating pizza and salads and loads of gelati!
ANNHIG - sounds like our taste is similar to yours.
I was planning $120 per day but I do think it's too much, however do want to have a realistic expectation

"I was planning $120 per day but I do think it's too much, however do want to have a realistic expectation"

Too much per person, not enough per family.

kcnewby - yes, our kids were around about that age when we did these trips. [lucky kids!]. the last time we were in Rome with jsut DS, we never cooked in our apartment at all! but we did use the equipment to squeeze oranges for spremuta, make tea, store our cold drinks, etc.

other things that can help you save money:

buy drinks like coke in large bottles and decant into smaller ones to take round with you,

fill up water bottles from the public water fountains in Rome,

eat and drink coffee etc standing up at the bar [sitting down, especially outside, is dearer]

instead of having dessert, buy some fruit to eat back at the apartment or on the hoof,

have breakfast out for €5 rather than in the hotel for €10 or more,

don't drink things like coke in cafes [beer or wine are much cheaper]

look for the dish of the day, especially for lunch

don't on any account allow yourselves to be talked into a restaurant by one of those chaps standing outside - almost invariably it'll end in bad food and a large bill.

if they offer you something that is not on the menu, ask the price first.

have a great trip!

Thanks so much, great advice.
And yes ANNHIG these kids are very lucky! Last trip with them, then it's just the two of us.... Much cheaper :)

Last trip with them, then it's just the two of us.... Much cheaper >>

that's what we said but we must have been doing something wrong, as we couldn't stop them coming with us.

this year will probably be the first year when neither of them come with us at all - that said it still won't be just the two of us as we are taking my mum instead!

We (as a couple, not as a family) find we enjoy going to the store and browsing "what's for dinner" is much more fun than going out to eat. We tend to eat a nice lunch out while doing our tourist trek and then having light breakfasts and dinners at home in the apartments. There are so many good things to try from the grocery stores and you can buy a lot of prepared foods that you can heat up and not even have to cook. I think your kids would have a blast shopping for dinner everyday.
I know this doesn't help you plan a budget. Sorry. I think if we go to a sit-down restaurant we probably don't spend less than $20 per person. But that is for a very simple lunch, say a pasta and salad, usually with a glass of wine. I guess if you did some homework and planned for the restaurants you could visit in the area of your itineraries you could come up with more realistic costs. We tend to just fall into a place, starving to death, and end up with either some horrible tourist plates (Paris) or some wonderful and memorable meal.

Sorry, I realized I had got a bit wordy and meant to preview and edit, but hit submit instead. Lo siento.

Oh ANNHIG, I feel for you hahahaha, that's us in the future, I can feel it!
Ok, looks like I am getting the picture,,,
Some days a lot, some days not. If I plan for the extreme, I should be pleasantly surprised.
Will definitely not be suffering food wise while we are away. Plan to Eat, Pray, Love leaning heavily toward the Eat! After all it's Italia!
Thanks all!