Alison Craig is a writer, a presenter and a pain in the neck.

Tom Kitchin the corkscrew curly headed Michelin chef with a lovely smile, a charming enthusiasm for all things food and an increasing brood of children as well as restaurants has just opened The Scran & Scallie in Edinburgh’s Stockbridge.

The Scran & Scallie touted simply as a ‘pub’ slid quickly into the iconic San Marco site in Stockbridge seamlessly opening on Easter weekend.  Opposite the soon to be revamped  Raeburn Hotel and round the corner from the new  Edinburgh Accies rugby ground and clubhouse this will bring lots of new faces and their purses to the area. A good thing as there was a point when Stockbridge consisted of a series of charity shops which was fine for daylight hours but after that well……things got a little quiet. But this is just the latest in along line of foodie delights in Raeburn Place. This should be good news for all the other businesses in the area. So what’s it like?

At £7.50 for a bog standard small glass of wine – not cheap. Well in fact if you consider you can get a bottle of wine for less than that then it’s darn expensive for a swally. Never mind a scallie.

So what about the food?

The food is good.

No the food is better than good. It is very good indeed.

I was just surprised at their price point. With the word pub, the expectation was of something accessible and family orientated where a chip for him, a pie for her and a half pint  for the old bird – that’s me obviously – would be on the cards for less than a Kings ransom is somewhat misguided. Don’t get me wrong it’s a great place but its’ not a day to day pop in every other day for a wee snack type place which in my old fashioned head is what a local is all about.

Let me elaborate. There is one menu from running all day so prices which you feel are not bad for dinner are also applicable at lunch which is a different thing altogether.  An example was the monkfish tail which was served on the bone and honestly delicious but at £18 that didn’t include vegetables of potatoes so you are instantly coerced into spending another fiver at least so it all adds up. Also the burger and chips was £18 – smelling salts for Miss Craig. OK maybe I am being too Aberdonian about it but if you do fancy something less expensive at lunchtime there are lots of places to choose from and you could do a lot worse than The Bailie, Buffalo Grill, Lancers, Hamiltons or Hectors, Bells Diner which are all within a 3 minutes shuffle from here. Of course people will come and eat and love it but as for the locals well its more of a special occasion destination in my book. Still opening a business in this climate is a sign of optimism and a new local business is aye a welcome thing. I wish them every success.

Twitter feeds of the above:

The Scran and Scallie – @ScranandScallie

Raeburn Hotel – @Raeburn

Edinburgh Accies @EdinburghAccies

Tom Kitchin @TomKitchin

Bailie Bar – @Bailie_Bar

{ 1 comment }