The record-low rupee is threatening to spoil the taste of gourmet dining, with several five-star hotels mulling a revision of their menu-card rates to offset the spiralling cost of kitchen ingredients.
Top-end hotels in India mostly use imported food items like meat, cheese, condiments, wines and liquor to pique the taste buds of their patrons. But with the rupee plumbing new lows,
these imports have become 10-15% costlier, making it tough for hoteliers to keep the "wow!" factor without raising rates.
"We will be constrained to revise prices at our restaurants and do menu re-engineering to alleviate the cost impact," said Rajiv Kaul, president of The Leela Palaces, Hotels and Resorts, which runs specialty restaurants 'Megu' and 'Le Cirque' at Leela Delhi. Nearly half of the cost of food for these restaurants is from imports.