When thinking of what to do for a $40 date night, a few standards come to mind. A movie is always a safe bet, perhaps a picnic, or a simple walk through downtown Santa Monica. All of these options are fine, but none of them combine Dinner, Drinks and Entertainment on a budget any frugal young professional can appreciate. With the lofty goals of producing an amazing night for $40 or less my girlfriend, Ashley, and I accomplished the following:

Dinner and Drinks:  We started at McCormick and Schmicks. When deciding on dinner, a cheap dinner with poor food won’t cut it. Happy hour must be utilized. Thus, I searched for the best happy hour in LA. I found a great one from Mccormick and Schmicks. Now for those of you that have never experienced the greatness that is Mccormick and Schmicks’ famous happy hour menu lets go through it: The hours are from 4pm-7pm and they have a nice but smaller selection of everything you could want for a  pricey dinner, except for the fact that everything is under $5.00! This includes a Half-Pound Gourmet Cheeseburger for $2.95. The most expensive item is Beer Battered Fish and Chips or Mussels for $4.95. On Wednesdays they have $1 Oysters and Thursdays is $1 Fish Tacos.  Now there is a catch, but you’ll like it. There is a $3.50 beverage purchase requirement per person. However, like the food, the drinks are a great deal, with Coors Light 10z Draft for $2.95 and some great choices for $5.00 or under.  All in all, their happy hour deserves to be famous.

What did we order on our date you ask? I had a grand ½ lbs Gourmet Burger for $2.95 and my date had a blackened Chicken Quesadilla for $3.95. We each had a 10oz Coors Light for $2.95 a peace. So, we made it out of a great dinner and drinks and spent $12.80. Not too shabby.

Entertainment: There is always interesting, fun and inexpensive activity to do in a city on a given night. On this night, we decided to see the Groundlings. For those that are not familiar, the Groundlings is a theatre just off of Melrose that is famous for its sketch comedy. Many familiar faces perform their regularly to keep up on their comedic craft. The Wednesday night we were there, two cast members from Reno 911 were performing with the main stage cast, which includes many recognizable faces from comedy central and other comedy sources of which you have most surely seen but cannot name. The show we saw was called The Crazy Uncle Joe Show, and it was hilarious, as the Groundlings always are. The show lasts about 2 hours and the atmosphere is amazing, with live music and an intimate stage. Now for the price. The first time I had taken a date here, I had convinced her I had spent a bunch on these tickets to get into this exclusive, hip, underground comedy club that not many people knew about. She completely bought it. This time I did not hide how much the tickets cost.  The price of the tickets for the night was $13 a person! If you go after 10pm on a Friday they are $9, and can be as much as $20. So entertainment for the evening was $26 total.

Conclusion: All in all we managed a great dinner, decent drinks, and great entertainment for a grand total of $38.80. That leaves a $1.20 for some breath mints on the way home.

Related posts:

1. Greg and Anna’s Los Angeles $40 Date Night
2. Chris’ Los Angeles $40 Date Night
3. Los Angeles $40 Date Night Challenge
4. Natalie and Damien’s Los Angeles $40 Date Night