Upscale Tehran Restaurants Charging $150 Entry

When you readily pay a $150 entry fee with no hassle, it won’t matter that the prices of the dishes aren’t mentioned on the menu, says a regular customer of Tehran’s most upscale restaurants, adding, “These restaurants give you the feeling of being someone special.”

The higher the price, the more customers are ready to spend at such places, reported the official Iranian government daily, Iran.

The people who frequent these ultra-expensive restaurants are branded as VIPs, the newspaper maintained noting, “The only reason to count them as VIP is the fact they are super-rich and can easily afford high entry fees plus ordering dishes on the ‘priceless’ bills of fare.”

The price these patrons pay for a three-course meal turns out to rival the monthly salary of an average white-collar office worker.

Majeed, who frequents one of these top-notch restaurants, tells the daily Iran, “In these restaurants’ ambience, one feels serenity and tranquility. One feels different from others. It’s precisely that: one feels special.”

In addition to paying $150 to just enter one of these restaurants, Majeed proudly maintains, he also insists on treating his guests.

He says he and fellow patrons pay no attention to the price of individual dishes after hefting out for the entry fee. “The waiters propose different dishes, and you pick your favorites, no matter the price. No prices are printed on the menus, whether it’s a starter, main course, salad or dessert.”

According to Majeed, these restaurants have a regular clientele.

“When one steps into such a restaurant, they should know they are going to spend a lot of money. And I mean ‘a lot’ -- something close to 20 million rials (roughly $600) for three people. It is highly unconventional, I believe,” Majeed said.

Most of these restaurants are located in the northern neighborhoods of the capital city, Tehran, daily Iran reported, adding, “To attract customers, they all have their own special methods and styles.”

“Most of the regular customers of these posh eateries prefer to have their meal in a calm atmosphere and a cozy ambience where nobody bothers them. They hate noise pollution and eyesores while eating their precious starter, pricey main course, and succulent dessert,” the newspaper said.

Children under the age of 10 are usually banned from such establishments since they are counted as sources of noise pollution.

The customers, a manager of one luxury restaurant tells daily Iran, “love to spend money. Sometimes, the higher the price, the more they want to spend.”

Meanwhile, the same manager asserts, “The reason behind our high prices is the fact that we use first class and Grade A materials plus presenting a collection of good services and facilities.”

A salad featuring Persian caviar and avocado dressed costs 4 million rials (roughly $120).

Earlier, in 2011, a Tehran restaurant serving gold-flecked ice cream for almost $130 a scoop made international headlines.

“Gold-flecked ice cream wasn’t part of the picture that Shi’ite Muslim clerics painted during the Iranian [Islamic] Revolution, when they promised to lift the poor by distributing the country’s vast oil income equally across society,” Thomas Erdbrink of The Washington Post reported at the time.

“But more than three decades later, record oil profits have brought in billions of dollars, and some people here are enjoying that decadent dessert. The trouble is, it’s just a small group of wealthy Iranians. Despite the promises of the revolution, many here say the gap between rich and poor has never seemed wider,” he noted.