My travels typically revolve around food, and I’ve found that one of the best ways to sample high-end cuisine without breaking the bank is to schedule what would typically be the most expensive restaurants during the lunch hour.

With the exception of the evening ambience, lunch at a fine-dining establishment mimics the dinner experience in the ways that count most: You get to sit in the same dining room, experience the same service, sample the same or similar items you’d find on the dinner menu, and in most cases, you’ll even get the hands-on refinement of having the executive chef in the house.

At Robert Del Grande’s RDG + Bar Annie, located in the heart of the Galleria area on Post Oak Blvd., you’d expect to find a suited business lunch crowd with expense accounts, and in the main dining room, you’ll certainly spy some power lunches in progress. But there are also couples dates, ladies who lunch and, on the afternoon I dined there, a millionairess socialite celebrating her birthday.

Personally, I think RDG is one of the most beautiful restaurants in the city. With luscious wood paneling accented by brushed metal, angular lines and lighting fixtures with a certain Mies van der Rohe chic, the decor is at once classic yet modern, the almost museum-like architectural elements framing the art that is Robert Del Grande’s cuisine.

If you’re intimidated by this picture, don’t be. The Express lunch menu at RDG is just $19, and for this price, you not only get the chance to dine among Houston’s elite, but you’ll also get an excellent three-course meal that includes a choice of soup or salad, a main course choice of burger or an entree salad, and choice of chocolate or vanilla cookie.

A la carte, a soup and RDG burger alone would run about $25, so the lunch special, designed for a quick in-and-out meal, is not only fast, but also a considerable value.

For the soup of the day, we had a chilled cream of asparagus soup attractively accented with floating bubbles of extra virgin olive oil. Pale green, smooth, creamy and positively sublime, the soup was an example of haute cuisine at its best. We were lucky to taste this off-the-menu creation: The soup had been made for a $500-a-head charity dinner benefitting the Houston Food Bank the night before.

Eschewing a lighter salad entree for my main, I ordered the RDG burger medium rare, a rich burger that was so tender, it practically melted in my mouth. The fresh artisanal bun from Slow Dough Bread Co. was dusted with chestnut powder, and the USDA prime beef patty, made from a specialty ground shoulder cut of beef, oozed with eminently satisfying juiciness in each bite.

The warm chocolate cookie was soft, moist and slightly chewy. It tasted almost like a warm chocolate cake, but was sized right so that I didn’t overindulge.

Fully satiated, I mentally checked off the list of all that I’d received for lunch. Impeccable service, chic decor, a soup worthy of a $500 meal dinner, what has got to be one of the best burgers in the city – all this overseen by chef Del Grande himself – for $19? Yes, haute cuisine without the price tag does exist. You just have to get it at lunch.

RDG + Bar Annie, 1800 Post Oak Blvd. near San Felipe, 713-840-1111