Shrimp Scampi in South Plainfield

6 restaurants in South Plainfield list shrimp scampi on their menus. The cheapest is Tony's Pizza & Restaurant at $18.95. The typical price across town is $22.95, and the dearest we found is $24.95 at Sherban's Diner, so the two ends of the list are $6.00 apart, which is 32% more for the same dish. Of the 6 kitchens listed, 2 charge more than a dollar under the typical price, 3 sit within a dollar of it and 1 charges more than a dollar over.

We track shrimp scampi in 272 other areas and compare them all on shrimp scampi across United States. The typical price there runs $23.00 at the median, so South Plainfield is cheaper than most of them, with a lower typical price than 148 of the 272. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $8.99 at Via Italian Table in Worcester, MA, and the highest best price is $32.00 in Red Bank, NJ. The nearest area with it is Piscataway, about 2 mi away, where the best price is $19.99.

Where is the cheapest shrimp scampi in South Plainfield? Tony's Pizza & Restaurant, at $18.95 on 716 Oak Tree Ave. The same dish reaches $24.95 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $6.00.

What should shrimp scampi cost here? About $22.95 is the typical price across the 6 kitchens in South Plainfield that list it. Of the ones listed above, 2 are more than a dollar below that and 1 is 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 Piscataway, about 2 mi away, where the best price is $19.99. 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.