Scottish Restaurants in Edinburgh
1. Wedgwood
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
267 Canongate - EH8
Celebrating its fifteenth year, Paul & Lisa Wedgwood’s basement restaurant is on (and partly under) the Royal Mile. Tastefully decorated, it wins strong all-round praise, especially for its competitively priced cuisine (there is a tasting menu, but also a seasonally changing à la carte option with a fair amount of choice).
2. Aizle
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
The Garden Room in The Kimpton Hotel, 38 Charlotte Square - EH2
“A lovely setting in the atrium that’s not too formal and with a pleasant buzz” sets the scene at Stuart Ralston’s bright, glass-roofed hotel dining room (he and his team moved on from a previous venture of the same name in Newington a couple of years ago). All reports acclaim “outstandingly good and inventive cooking” from the six-course menu (going up to £105 per person in 2023 from £85) and “friendly service”.
3. Rhubarb, Prestonfield Hotel
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
Priestfield Rd - EH16
In the same stable as Edinburgh’s famous Witchery, James Thomson’s lavishly decorated hotel sits in 20 acres near Arthur’s Seat and its rococo interior “never fails to please for a romantic occasion”. The food is not centre stage, but is consistently well-rated too, with menu options including an à la carte menu, three-course ‘fine dining’ option and afternoon tea.
4. Restaurant Martin Wishart
French restaurant in Edinburgh
54 The Shore - EH6
“Loved it! Everything is just right” at Martin Wishart’s harbourside flagship: one of the city’s most accoladed culinary destinations, where his menus of “Frenchified Scottish ingredients” offer “decadent luxury” in “the cool, gentrified environs” of the Leith waterfront. “Every bit as good as the first time I came nearly 20 years ago”, it’s held a “Michelin star for 20 years for a reason”. It might be “slightly hushed and reverential for my (London!) tastes, but it totally deserves its accolades!”
5. Bonnie & Wild’s Scottish Marketplace
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
St James Quarter, 415-417 St James Crescent - EH1
2022 Review: Launched in July 2021, Scotland’s largest food hall (and Edinburgh’s first) features a range of chef-led food stalls and restaurants. These include The Gannet East, Creel Caught, Erpingham House, El Perro Negro, east PIZZAS, Broken Clock, Joelato, Salt & Chilli Oriental and CHIX. Also houses Inverarity Morton’s boutique bottleshop.
6. The Spence at Gleneagles Townhouse
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
39 St Andrew Square - EH2
With 33 bedrooms, the first-ever spin-off from the world famous sporting estate finally opened in June 2022 (it was originally scheduled for 2021) in the former HQ of the Bank of Scotland, complete with an all-day restaurant under the cupola of the former banking hall that’s relatively casual for this grand address. In July 2022, Gaby Soutar of the Scotsman paid it a visit, declaring the food offering as “casual, but with luxurious tweaks. Birthday food”. All seemed generally very satisfactory, although the review stops short of being an out-and-out rave.
7. Creel Caught
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
Bonnie & Wild Marketplace, St James Quarter, 415-417 St James Crescent - EH1
2022 Review: MasterChef: The Professionals winner Gary Maclean opened his first restaurant in summer 2021 on the fourth floor of the Bonnie & Wild Marketplace: Edinburgh's first food hall in St James Quarter. The menu champions sustainable Scottish seafood, with the ‘award-winning Arbroath Smokies’ a signature dish.
8. Howies
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
29 Waterloo Place - EH1
2021 Review: David Howie Scott’s flagship venue at the foot of Calton Hill celebrates its 30th anniversary last year as a purveyor of inexpensive Scottish classics. The odd reporter feels that it’s “nice enough, but not the stand-out it could be”, but that’s within the context of pretty solid ratings overall. There are two spinoffs in Edinburgh and one in Aberdeen.
9. Angels With Bagpipes
British, Traditional restaurant in Edinburgh
343 High St, Royal Mile - EH1
2021 Review: Owned by the Crolla family (who started Valvona & Crolla, Scotland’s oldest deli and Italian wine merchant – see also), this sixteenth century fine dining spot is a beacon on the otherwise touristy Royal Mile owing to its “well-cooked and well-seasoned” Scottish fare and “good value Sunday lunch”; for a truly intimate dining experience, try ‘Halo’, upstairs, which seats just four.
10. Taisteal
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
1 Forth St - EH1
2022 Review: In 2021, Gordon Craig and wife Lucy moved their well-rated operation of five years’ standing from Raeburn Place to this new address in the New Town, on the site of Le Roi Fou (RIP). Our feedback remains enthusiastic for its innovative use of British ingredients. “There’s a market menu, which is a steal, and full tasting options if you’re feeling hungrier. Highly recommended”.
11. Mono
Italian restaurant in Edinburgh
85 South Bridge - EH1
2021 Review: “Making other fine dining establishments in town look somewhat staid, out of touch and overpriced” – this April 2018 newcomer is “superb”, and some would say “the best restaurant to have opened in Edinburgh in recent times”. “A charismatic space” with “splendid service” – “the reference on its website to ‘progressive Italian dining’ is accurate” and the modern cuisine is “outstanding” – “go downstairs to see the kitchen in action”. To match the fine cooking there’s “an exceptional, mostly Italian, wine list”.
12. Fhior
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
36 Broughton Street - EH1
This “fun, stylish and super-friendly restaurant” from chef Scott Smith and his wife Laura has a very serious mission – to showcase ultra-seasonal Scottish ingredients, many of them grown in their own kitchen garden. The cooking is of “superb quality”, and “the tasting menu beautifully thought through, so each course feels as though it belongs after the previous one”. Fhior, meaning ‘true’ in Gaelic, is the Smiths’ follow-up to their highly regarded debut Norn, in Leith.
13. L’Escargot Bleu
French restaurant in Edinburgh
56 Broughton St - EH1
“Like a Gallic hug”, chef-patron Fred Berkmiller’s “properly sourced old-school French cuisine” comes packaged with “Gallic good humour, impeccable service and quirky decoration in this wonderfully authentic restaurant”, “now with new wine bar underneath”. Sadly, its nearby sibling L’Escargot Blanc closed down last year after 18 years.
14. The Witchery by the Castle
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
Castlehill, The Royal Mile - EH1
“Definitely an experience” – James Thomson’s “glorious” 40-year restoration of a 1595 merchant’s house next to the castle makes a “totally unique and intimate location” for a candle-lit meal, either in the wood-panelled dining room, filled with leather furnishings and hung with tapestries, or in the ‘Secret Garden’. The “atmospheric setting” is “perfect for a romantic dinner” so long as you “don’t expect too much gastronomically” from the traditional menu – and there is a “killer wine list – sorry, Wine Bible”.
15. Rico's
Italian restaurant in Edinburgh
58a Castle Street - EH2
“Amazing Italian cooking using Scottish produce – impeccable – and with outstanding service” inspires excellent feedback on this stylish and moodily decorated New Town site. It was opened in mid 2021 by Stefano Pieraccini of the Rocca Group in premises vacated by Martin Wishart’s The Honour (RIP).
16. New Chapter
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
18 Eyre Pl. - EH3
This “popular” local from chef Maciej Szymik gives seasonal Scottish produce a modern European twist, earning general all-round approval. There’s also a spin-off brasserie in the West End: Otro.
17. Timberyard
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
10 Lady Lawson St - EH3
The Radford family’s Victorian warehouse conversion remains “relentlessly inventive and delicious”, a decade after they were among the first to bring the lessons of ‘new Nordic’ cuisine to Scotland, with foraged or pickled ingredients presented in industrial-style premises. Head chef James Murray (ex-Lyles, Le Manoir & Nur in Hong Kong) joined the team last year. Natural and low-intervention wines are also an important part of the experience. Even a diner who felt “the food is overhyped” said “what an amazing place!”
18. The Palmerston
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
1 Palmerston Place - EH12
This year-old venture in a converted bank – restaurant, bar, bakery, coffee shop and butchery – “has taken Edinburgh by storm” with its “very unfussy and robust cooking, relaxed atmosphere” – and its excellent in-house baked goods. The “shabby-chic premises belie stunning prep and cooking” from ex-Spring chef Lloyd Morse, who has teamed up with ex-Harwood Arms GM James Snowdon. Top Tip – “on no account depart without buying one of their loaves”.
19. Scran & Scallie
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
1 Comely Bank Rd - EH4
“Everything is spot-on” at this “lively” and “inventive” gastropub from a top-class chef – “we love it, and it’s great to take international visitors as it showcases Scottish produce”. With its “good pies and loads of local beers”, the place “doesn’t forget it’s a pub” – but the “wonderful, skilled cooking” makes it “more than just that”. He might not like to hear this, but “we enjoyed this far more than Tom Kitchin’s main restaurant”.
20. The Kitchin
Scottish restaurant in Edinburgh
78 Commercial Street - EH6
“A truly a fantastic experience from start to finish” – Tom & Michaela’s flagship venue occupies a “buzzy” warehouse in Leith and was again Edinburgh’s most commented-on destination in our annual diners’ poll. Criticism is impressively absent: there is nothing but reams of praise for “excellent fine dining”, produced from a glass-walled kitchen whose chefs create an “amazing food journey” (with “Tom and his senior team also coming out into the dining room to talk about the dishes”). There are tasting menus for either £130 or £180, with a more conventional evening à la carte menu priced at £110 (the best bargain being the set lunch, which is half this price). “An expensive experience, but well worth it and a real treat”. “Despite a lot of competition in Edinburgh now, Kitchin holds its head up high”.
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