The Price of Shrimp Cocktail

The shrimp cocktail at the comically exclusive Polo Bar in Manhattan is an imposing specimen, the crustaceans arriving tightly shingled on a steeple of ice accented by a celery spire.To devour one in a single bite would be gluttonous.

Each requires at least three bites to enjoy — and to ensure the tail meat is excavated.The hefty Gulf shrimp at the Polo Bar appear to be “U-10s,” a size classification that indicates there are fewer than 10 to a pound.Each bite will run you $2.83, roughly the price of the MetroCard swipe to get there (though Polo Bar patrons seem unlikely to arrive by subway).

But at $34 for four shrimp, this is hardly the most expensive shrimp cocktail in the United States.At heritage steakhouses, beachside dining rooms and birthday-destination chains, diners are sparing no expense to indulge in a little midcentury hedonism by the coupe glass.At the Scottsdale, Ariz., location of Maple & Ash, a steakhouse with an outpost in Chicago and another opening soon in Miami, $35 gets you four wild blue prawns.At Thomas Keller’s Michelin-starred Surf Club Restaurant in Miami, $34 buys you three U-10s from the Gulf of Mexico.

For $32 you get three jumbo shrimp at BLVD Steak in Los Angeles.And $30 buys four jumbo shrimp at the Boston, Denver and Phoenix locations of Ocean Prime.Just two years ago, Bon Appétit lamented that shrimp cocktail had entered “its $30 era.” At Old Homestead Steakhouse in the meatpacking district of Manhattan, four jumbo shrimp will run you a nice, round $40....