£5M. That's what punters at Royal Ascot are spending on champagne alone. It must be the biggest feast that York has ever seen.

Champagne, fine wines, smoked salmon and strawberries have been wolfed down in staggering quantities during the five-day Royal Ascot at York festival.

The statistics are mind-boggling. Racegoers have consumed about 120,000 bottles of champagne - at a cost of up to £126 for a 1996 vintage Don Perignon from the Moet & Chandon stall.

They have downed another 75,000 bottles of wine, 10,000 bottles of Pimms and up to 2,000 kegs of beer.

They have also eaten more than 2,000 tonnes of smoked salmon, 5,000 lobsters and four tonnes of strawberries, accompanied by 1,000 gallons of cream.

At the Knavesmire Restaurant, diners have been paying £47.30 per head for a three-course meal, washed down by wine costing up to £58.30 for a bottle of Burgundy or £81.10 for a bottle of 1997 vintage Bollinger champagne.

Mouthwatering starters on the menu include char-grilled Scotch salmon and lemon sole, with scallop, crayfish and smoked haddock confit, cucumber and spinach oil.

Elsewhere on the racecourse, 3,500 corporate hospitality guests have been sitting down each day to eat in a tented village, while four champagne bars are selling nothing but bubbly. Pimms has been on sale at another bar at £16 for a jug.

At the other end of the spectrum, Vinegar Joe's stall has been selling cod and chips for £5.50, with cans of Fosters Lager retailing at £3 at the bar next door. Another stall has been selling roast beef or pork baguettes for £5, while strawberries and cream were selling elsewhere for £3.50. The bargain of the day was Jumbo Hot Dogs, costing only £3.

John Uphill, general manager of Ascot Hospitality, which is managed by Sodexho Prestige, said: "Moving Royal Ascot to York has been an enormous undertaking."

A Sodexho spokesman said there were 3,000 waiters, bar tenders and front-of-house staff at the racecourse, along with 700 back office staff, 150 chefs and 200 managers. Eighty per cent of the temporary staff - all of whom were given a full day's training - were recruited from the York and Leeds area. "Hundreds of hotel beds, cottages and mobile homes have been booked to put up 450 staff who need accommodation."

Police said there had been "no significant public disorder" as racegoers hit the city centre last night.

Meanwhile, City of York MP Hugh Bayley has called for royal patronage at future York Ebor meetings, while Anne MacIntosh, MP for the Vale of York, has tabled a Commons Early Day Motion to congratulate the city on a successful week's racing.

Updated: 12:58 Saturday, June 18, 2005