Calamari in Edison

8 restaurants in Edison list calamari on their menus. The cheapest is Our Place Pizza & Catering at $12.95, listed as Fried Calamari. The typical price across town is $15.85, and the dearest we found is $20.00 at Francesco's Pizzeria & Restaurant, so the two ends of the list are $7.05 apart, which is 54% more for the same dish. Of the 8 kitchens listed, 2 charge more than a dollar under the typical price, 4 sit within a dollar of it and 2 charge more than a dollar over.

We track calamari in 493 other areas and compare them all on calamari across United States. The typical price there runs $15.42 at the median, so Edison is dearer than most of them, with a lower typical price than 232 of the 493. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $4.50 at French Quarter Grille in Austin, TX, and the highest best price is $19.75 in Harwood Heights, IL. The nearest area with it is Metuchen, about 1 mi away, where the best price is $13.99.

Where is the cheapest calamari in Edison? Our Place Pizza & Catering, at $12.95 on 938 Inman Ave. The same dish reaches $20.00 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $7.05.

What should calamari cost here? About $15.85 is the typical price across the 8 kitchens in Edison that list it. Of the ones listed above, 2 are more than a dollar below that and 2 are more than a dollar above, so the typical price is a middle rather than a floor.

Is it cheaper nearby? The nearest area we track it in is Metuchen, about 1 mi away, where the best price is $13.99. That is $1.04 more than the best price here.

Why do the prices differ so much? We compare what each menu calls the same dish, and menus are not identical: portion, cut, sides and the kind of room you are sitting in all ride on the price, and none of that shows up in a number. Part portions and half sizes are kept out of this comparison, and a chain charging the same at several addresses is counted once, so the spread above is between genuinely different kitchens rather than the same one repeated.