The Edinburgh Castle Pub

What can I say? This place is going to become VERY popular VERY quickly! The waitress who sat us down was lovely and friendly (I think she was from NZ...not that it matters 😆). She gave us our menus and explained the dishes as there are a few sharer plates. We were then served by the manager for the rest of the evening who was equally friendly and attentive. Top service all round! But that's not the best bit. The food was INCREDIBLE! The menu changes but for our visit there were 4 or 5 'nibble/snack' options, maybe 6 or 7 starters and the same number of mains. As we were a larger group we decided to order stuff to share among all of us....so to start we went for a dozen oysters, 2 portions of pork scratchings, 2 portions of sourdough bread and 2 portions of 'cheese doughnuts'...all from the snack part of the menu. Everything was so so good. The oysters were ultra fresh, shucked perfectly and served with a lovely dressing already applied. The pork scratchings were actually thin biscuits of pork crackling - served hot and really really crispy. The bread is sourced from Pollen bakery (like many Mcr restaurants) but for £4.50 they gave us 4 thick slices with a generous amount of whipped butter made in house. Compare that to Hawksmoor in Mcr where you get 1 slice of the same bread for £5! Finally the cheese doughnuts were the star of the show...4 crispy and fluffy mini doughnut balls filled with oozy cheese...honestly you could eat 20 of them! For mains we ordered 3 of their sharer plates. A whole roast plaice served with a herby beurre blanc sauce and tobiko fish eggs on top. A 1kg bone-in sirloin steak served with a rich borderlaise sauce...and an oxtail and walnut pie. They had 3 sides - beef dripping chips, seasonal greens and smoked sweetcorn...so we ordered all of them. Every dish was phenomenal! The fish was huge, ultra fresh and cooked to perfection...and the sauce was brilliant. The steak was the star of the show imo...the beef had an amazing deep flavour and the sauce was to die for...literally the best beef jus/borderlaise/gravy I've ever eaten. The added bonus was that the bone part of the sirloin included the short rib...something I've never seen before...and the meat around the cross-cut ribs was even tastier than the steak! The pie ended up being too much for us...which was not to say it wasn't great...because it was. But it is super rich...with the butter-iest pastry encasing rich braised oxtail. It came with a generous jug of the same sauce that was on the steak. It was great...but it's a heavyweight dish! All the mains we ordered were generous sharers for 2...the pie could serve 3...and the prices were really good. The fish was £30, the steak was £70 and the pie was £40. A 1kg sirloin at Hawksmoor would set you back £100...£110 with 2 meagre sauce pots. The steak there is nowhere near as good as this was - neither is the sauce. And we got double the sauce here! The beef dripping chips and seasonal greens were equally amazing. The chips especially were so crispy on the outside and fluffy inside...again just on a different level to the same thing at Hawksmoor. The wine list is well put together...with a good selection of whites and reds ranging from £30-60 odd quid. Both the white and red we chose were around £40 a bottle and really good quality...I just can't remember what they were called! If I had 2 minor critiques it was that a. The sweetcorn side was pretty average compared to everything else and b. They refused to give us any ketchup for the chips as they make all their sauces in house. All in we had the dozen oysters, 6 snack starters, 3 main sharers, 4 sides, 3 bottles of wine and 4 pints. We were too full for desert and the bill was £400...which I think was amazingly reasonable for the quality of food we ate.

Simply divine. We went for Sunday dinner and the place has got a great vibe - two courses are now £30 and £35 for three. For the quality of the food, thought that was pretty reasonable. The beef dinner was incredible - genuinely doubt we will have a better one. The mustard creme fraise 🤤 the service was also great. No hesitation going back.