Best Historic Restaurants in Old Town

From arriving to leaving our experience was fantastic. Food lovely, drink fantastic, waiting staff attentive. We had our food and the staff then came to say they had reserved us seats in the bar where we continued to have a few drinks relaxed and chatted. Lovely way to spend a Saturday afternoon coming up to Christmas.

Great tasting food and the service was attentive we had oysters as a taster which was a great experience. Salmon was fabulous and the filet steak was out of this world. Loved it. The staff were great with the right level of attentiveness and brought all we asked with a smile and some light chat. The restaurant is a little cool if you sit in the corridor on the lower floor.

Meeting with friends before Christmas we wanted to find a venue which wasn’t offering a “festive menu”. The Bistrot retained its usual menu and offer of 2 or 3 courses at a very reasonable cost, especially in such close proximity to Christmas. We were also delighted to be seated in a quieter part of the restaurant (being a group of 5) which allowed us to chat and hear one another (again not always easy to find at this time of year). There was a very good choice of dishes available from the menu; service was efficient but we were not rushed, and we would certainly return again and recommend to others.

We booked last minute for lunch on 17 December and got a table at Cafe Royal for 1430 hours. We enjoyed sharing the sourdough with crab butter and then my wife had sun blushed tomato sandwich with avocado and rosemary tinged fries. I went for the classic fish and chips. House white wine was delicious. A very pleasant experience and an enjoyable way to spend an hour in the week before Christmas in the oldest oyster bar in Scotland!

I love coming here whenever I'm in Edinburgh. The food is great and everyone always takes such good care of us.