Poutine in Ottawa

16 restaurants in Ottawa list poutine on their menus. The cheapest is Kelseys Original Roadhouse at $5.98. The typical price across town is $13.95, and the dearest we found is $21.25 at Broadway Bar & Grill, so the two ends of the list are $15.27 apart, which is 255% more for the same dish. Of the 16 kitchens listed, 6 charge more than a dollar under the typical price, 2 sit within a dollar of it and 8 charge more than a dollar over.

We track poutine in 40 other areas and compare them all on poutine across Canada. The typical price there runs $10.99 at the median, so Ottawa is dearer than most of them, with a lower typical price than 4 of the 40. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $4.00 at Cramdon's Tap & Eatery in Windsor, ON, and the highest best price is $12.00 in Banff, AB. The nearest area with it is Kingston, about 140 km away, where the best price is $5.98.

Where is the cheapest poutine in Ottawa? Kelseys Original Roadhouse, at $5.98 on 2206 Bank St. The same dish reaches $21.25 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $15.27.

What should poutine cost here? About $13.95 is the typical price across the 16 kitchens in Ottawa that list it. Of the ones listed above, 6 are more than a dollar below that and 8 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 Kingston, about 140 km away, where the best price is $5.98. That is the same as 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.