Food&Drink Recent Openings
The best of the new restaurant, café and bar openings in Glasgow and Edinburgh Glasgow
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to table. Highlights include txoripan, a warm, flaky bread studded with nuggets of chorizo, or silky fillets of hake with high-toned salsa verde. Best are the patatas: crisp and fluffy and with an earthy flavour that only comes from careful sourcing.
THE LIBERTINE BARS & PUBS
45–47 Bell Street, Merchant City, G1 1NX, 0141 552 3539, £6.95 (set lunch) / £12 (dinner) Named after the decadent 17th-century poet, the 2nd Earl of Rochester, the Libertine neatly balances daytime bistro and night-time bar. Tall windows line both aspects, brightening the huge booths and intimate tables in the modern Victorian interior. Small plates, such as nachos and rice balls, are good sharers, while mains feature the likes of beer-battered haddock, but it’s the traditional pie range that really stands out – with the creamy filling of the chicken and bacon offering buried beneath a crispy, buttery crust, accompanied by mash and seasonal veg. It’s a pleasant reminder of how good classic home-cooked meals can be.
NACHOS MEXICAN
15 Skirving Street, Southside, G41 3AB, 0141 616 6666, £13 (dinner) Nachos’ spacious open-plan dining room, well suited to couples, groups and families, is colourfully decorated with Mexico’s cultural and architectural icons in spray-painted murals. Expect some genuine flavours from classics such as tacos, fajitas, burritos, and enchiladas, available in various meat, chicken, seafood and veggie combos, with sauces and salsas spiced to order – regular, hot or extreme. Crispy corn or super soft tortillas are accompanied by fresh salsa, guacamole, and sour cream and Monterey Jack cheese, keeping flavours well balanced. With an impressive array of tapas dishes available Tuesday and Wednesday, plus regular starters and large mains such as chilli con carne and mole chicken, there’s plenty here to feast upon.
VERONA ITALIAN
88 West Regent Street, City Centre, G2 2QZ, 0141 332 7414, verona- 32 THE LIST 17 Nov–15 Dec 2011
Dream debut
Having delivered sophisticated beer’n’burger pubs such as Holyrood 9A to Edinburgh, Fuller Thomson have struck out west, as Steven Dick reports
B eer and a burger – Bruadar’s is a simple enough formula, but with so many quality variables it is one which delivers genuinely satisfying results. Twenty burgers include the expected beefy standards, a few chicken and five vegetarian choices – including ‘the chilli death’ with its accompanying health warning. All are thoughtfully presented, impressively generous, and accompanied by a cute bucket of skinny chips, coleslaw and dill pickle – with nice price tags that get even nicer before 6pm. There are also brunch choices until 5pm, sharing boards featuring mini burgers, and salads. The choice of beers is as overwhelming as the burgers. Scottish craft beer favourites from BrewDog, Tempest and Black Isle join kegs from other innovative UK, Belgian and US breweries. With 12 permanent pumps and eight rotating cask/keg ales it’s hard to know where to start – but the third-pint tasting measures certainly help. Spread over two floors, Bruadar (‘dream’ in Gaelic) is an attractive, minimalistic venue with bench seating downstairs and a more intimate mezzanine, all flooded with light from the large window looking out up Byres Road.
BRUADAR
Bruadar, The Millhouse, 2 Partickbridge Street, West End, G11 6PL
0141 337 1200, fullerthomson.com Ave. price two-course meal: £13 (lunch / dinner)
glasgow.co.uk, £6 (set lunch) / £15 (dinner) With gaudy neon lighting outside and an interior that is about as authentically Italian as a fake Gucci handbag – grey walls and black leather booths oozing a lounge bar vibe – this newcomer is about as far removed from actual Verona as you can get. The saving grace is the fresh and tasty food – with real bargains offered such as a £7 three-course lunch deal. The à la carte calamari starter is fried to perfection, while the ‘man-sized’ main course of calzone veg packs both an aesthetic and taste punch, and tagliatelle casa mia is creamy and filling. The pistachio ice cream from a small dessert menu is worth a taste.
Edinburgh MALVAROSA
SPANISH
262 Portobello High Street, Portobello, EH15 2AT, 0131 669 7711, malvarosa.co.uk, £7.90 (set lunch) / £17 (dinner) Madrid native Alvaro Bernabeu greets guests with a wry smile and many a cheeky comment, dishing out delicious tapas that could be as close as Edinburgh gets to this inherently Mediterranean way of eating. Dishes come as thick and fast as the kitchen can deliver, provided Alvaro can be distracted from chatting to the customers for long enough to bring them
ARTCAFE MORITA JAPANESE
204 Canongate, Old Town, EH8 8DQ, 0131 667 1337, artcafe.morita.co.uk, £7.70 (set lunch) Positioned halfway down the Royal Mile, ArtCafe Morita combines traditional café, Japanese fast food outlet and ambitious gallery space. Proprietor Kozo Hoshino is the custodian of a large private art collection, from which he has plucked a dozen pieces to brighten up the café walls. The menu of home-cooked Japanese treats includes gyoza, a limited selection of made-to-order sushi and various fried noodle dishes. The lunch time set meal of panko-covered chicken with curry sauce is great value at £7.70 (with rice and a very capable miso soup). On the traditional side there are various filled rolls, cakes, fresh Java coffee and even a generous cooked breakfast.
THE HAVEN CAFES
9 Anchorfield, Newhaven, EH6 4JG, 0131 467 7513, havencafe.co.uk, £7 (lunch) Between Leith’s gentrified Shore area and Newhaven Harbour lies an unremarkable industrial stretch dominated by Chancelot Mill. This unlikely setting hasn’t put off café newcomer Natalie Kwek one bit, however, and it’s here that she’s created a lovely new space out of an old greasy spoon. Original cornicing, vintage objects and mismatched furniture restore character, while food is straightforward, fresh and attractive, focused on all-day breakfasts and home baking including cute cupcakes, stacked sandwich cakes, artily iced biscuits and super- sweet raspberry cheesecake brownies.
Independent write-ups on all the restaurants worth knowing about in Glasgow and Edinburgh are available on our online Eating & Drinking Guide at list.co.uk/food-and-drink Prices shown are for an average two-course meal for one.