Breakfast Nomination #7 - the Tower Restaurant in the National Museum of Scotland

Nomination  #7 - the Tower Restaurant in the National Museum of Scotland 

Nominated by Claire Wheelan

Originally reviewed on November 15th, 2015 

"They're going to throw us out, 'cos we're SCUM!"

His score: 4.8/6
My score: fancy but overpriced

He ate: ham hock with fried eggs and toast (£8.95) and a hot chocolate (£4.50!!!)
I ate: French toast with Ayrshire bacon and maple syrup (£8.50), also with a hot chocolate (£4.50!!!)
Total cost: £26.45

Our pros: nice views (probably would be better on a nicer day, obviously); friendly staff; really nice décor with a bright and clean atmosphere; offered different things on the menu from the norm such as granola, porridge, ham hock etc; our food was delayed but only because the chef was unhappy with how the dishes had turned out so he remade them so they were to his high standards and this was explained by the waitress; you can book online before you go to ensure you have a table; and lastly, the place was extremely fancy but the staff made us feel very welcome despite us both walking in drenched by the rain and in our check flannel shirts and fingerless gloves like a pair of hobos. 
Our Cons: hot chocolate and teas were priced as £3.95 on the online menu but were actually £4.50 in the restaurant; there didn't seem to be English breakfast tea on offer at all so we settled for a hot chocolate that was sickly sweet with bitter cocoa sprinkled on top and I'm genuinely shocked at the fact it cost nearly £5 as I wouldn't pay that even for the best hot chocolate out there, let alone for one that was a few sickly, lukewarm mouthfuls; strange edible flowers sprinkled all over both our meals, so were presumably for decoration but tasted bitter and earthy so we had to pick them off so as not to spoil our food; staff were friendly but a tad overbearing and felt like they were almost scared (perhaps used to more intense and rude customers with it being quite a fancy place) when asking us if we were ok and clearing dishes etc; my food was very sickly (perhaps too early in the day for maple syrup) and made me feel unwell after, also portions were small for the price and although the food was definitely cooked well and of high quality, it felt more as though we were paying for the service and fancy surroundings more than the quantity and quality of the food we were getting.

Our experience:  We think we would go back here for other meals, and if I were to go back for "brunch" (as they call it on the menu) then I would order something different. 

My food was a bit sickly sweet and I was put off by the fact they don't seem to offer regular English Breakfast tea. 

It was refreshing to see a few new things on the menu as I mentioned earlier, but they fact they had no traditional breakfasts on offer (i.e. full Scottish) was a bit odd. 

There were mostly variations of Eggs Benedict or French Toast so as much as it was nice to see granola and porridge on the menu, it would've been nice to have some traditional café breakfast-type foods too. 

You get a nice view of the castle from your seats and on better days you can sit on the small terrace outside. We would love to go back here on a sunny/warm day and enjoy the outside seating. Unfortunately today, it was just rain and mist on offer on the Edinburgh skyline. 

I would recommend this place to anyone looking for a fancy experience - we had our coats taken to be hung up, napkins placed on our (uncomfortable working class) laps and drank our (free) tap water out of big wine glasses. We did feel a little bit like fish out of water at times, but the staff were very friendly and not snobby despite how fancy the place clearly was. 

What’s next: Our next nomination is Bijou Bistro on Leith Links, nominated by Megan McFarlane.

Breakfast Nomination #6 - the Ship on the Shore, on the Shore (obviously)

Nomination  #6 - the Ship on the Shore, on the Shore

Nominated by our supervisor, Strevs

Originally reviewed on November 8th, 2015 

His score: 5/6
My score: might not go back for breakfast but I'd definitely go back for other meals

He ate: the Ship's Classic Breakfast (essentially a full cooked breakfast) (£9) and an English Breakfast tea (£2.50).
I ate: the Ship's Eggs 'Royale' (eggs Benedict with salmon) (£9) and also a tea (£2.50).
Total cost: £23

Our pros: good, attentive customer service; nice, cosy interior; quite a fancy selection of food but not so fancy you wouldn't know what you were ordering; fresh food and everything seemed to be locally sourced, especially the salmon which was probably the best salmon I've ever had - smoky and delicious; breakfast felt quite light which can sometimes be rare when you're having a cooked breakfast as it usually winds up sitting in your stomach all day, also the restaurant was in a nice area, though a little out the way, so it was nice to go for a walk along the waterfront after breakfast. 
Our Cons: my poached eggs were completely flavourless and I felt like all I could taste was the water they'd been boiled in; Gary's fried egg was overcooked and also flavourless and the breakfast felt expensive for the portions we got but it has to be noted that the quality of most parts of the meal were pretty high i.e. Gary's bacon was perfectly cooked and had no fat on it and he also said the sausages were great and he even enjoyed the black pudding which he doesn't normally even like, it was just that when you look at the portion you get for paying £9 it could feel a little like you're getting ripped off. 

Our experience: It took us 3 months, but we finally did it! 

During the past 3 months, Gary and I have been going to other breakfast spots (because we were too lazy to go to Leith to do this nomination and there was confusing information on the website for this place saying the serve breakfast until 11:30am but served FOOD from 12pm-10pm) and it felt like we'd been cursed because I cannot name one place we've been to since our last nomination that gave us quality breakfast or even good service.
One of the worst places we visited back in October was Bruno's 7-7 Diner in High Riggs. We got rude, slow service and the food was disgusting and shockingly over-priced. I'm not over-exaggerating when I say that we felt literally robbed when we were given the bill for the slop that we barely ate and had waited over 40 minutes to even receive it. We nearly walked out, and I wish we had because it really ruined our day and leaves a bad taste in our mouths even now.
We were chastised by an employee during our visit to Bruno's then insulted after leaving a review for the place online so we were in desperate need to go to a place that served nice food and gave service that was something even just slightly above 'appalling' to make up for the experience.
So hopefully now we've done *this* nomination, we will have broken the curse! 

The service was lovely here and compared to that shithole (Bruno's Diner) that we went to last Sunday, it wouldn't be hard to beat. 
The waitresses that served us were attentive and nice but not overbearing - they gave us space but made sure they checked back on us at regular intervals. 
At one point I stupidly knocked my knife onto the floor and the waitress quickly came over and offered me another one straight away even though I was just being a clumsy oaf. 

Initially the place seemed perhaps overly-fancy, there was actually cutlery on the table that neither of us knew what to do with but thankfully the waitress promptly removed them after we ordered - either cos she knew we weren't going to need them or she could sense we were uncultured swine who wouldn't know what to do with them even if she had left them behind. 

The biggest let down for me just had to be my poached eggs because they tasted of nothing but the water they'd been boiled in, and I think my muffins could've done with being more toasted as they got soggy quick under the mountain of Hollandaise sauce they were delivered with. 
But the salmon was delicious so perhaps they were just having an off day eggs-wise. 

Gary and I agreed we might not go back for breakfast, or if we did we'd maybe order something different, but we would definitely go back for lunch or dinner because the food quality was high and it felt welcoming despite seeming quite fancy on the surface. 

If you were feeling particularly fancy one day, you could order a champagne breakfast for £22 - that gives you a glass of champagne, any breakfast on the menu, a tea or coffee and a basket of toast is included. 

What’s next: Our next nomination is the Tower Restaurant in the National Museum on Chamber Street, nominated by Claire Wheelan. Hopefully it won't take us 3 months to go do that one... I also hope we've broken "the curse" now as I swear we've had nothing but shit food and service everywhere since we went to Patisserie Valerie (obviously I mean outside of this breakfast challenge)!

Breakfast Nomination #5 - Patisserie Valerie on North Bridge

Nomination #5 - Patisserie Valerie on North Bridge

Nominated by My oldest, deary friend Ashley

Originally reviewed on August 2nd, 2015 

"I like my eggs to have a bit of randomness about them."

His score: 5.6/6
My score: tasty tasty

He ate: a blueberry muffin (£2.20), a full Scottish Breakfast (£7.95) and an English Breakfast tea (£2.75)
I ate: a pain au chocolat (£2.50), eggs Royale (essentially eggs Benedict with salmon) (£8.50) and also a tea (£2.75)
Total cost: £26.65

Our pros: friendly service despite busyness; really tasty food that tasted fresh and well cooked; they offer sit in or takeaway service; really pleasant atmosphere and I loved the décor (lots of framed vintage prints and gold framed mirrors); it was really nice ordering a sweet treat with breakfast and they have a huge selection of amazingly tasty things, I had trouble resisting the urge to order them all. 
Our Cons: really huge tea serving set for some reason so it took up quite a lot of the table; quite a long wait between getting the bill and the waitress collecting the payment; some quite high prices on things that was a little off-putting, and the service started off a little flustered due to the masses in the café though that did calm quite rapidly once we were seated. 

Our experience: Firstly, this is our most delayed review ever as it's already been over 24 hours since we even ate this breakfast but hey, I get lazy sometimes! Anyway, here it is. 

I think after a string of not so spectacular places, Patisserie Valerie definitely stood out. 
If I'm honest, I was a little put off initially as we arrived during the lunch rush and we were told there'd be a wait. I'm fine with waiting, however during this wait I was looking around at what sort of things were on offer and all I could see in the pastry case was about 75 different types of tarts (as it transpires, all the delicious cakes get put in the window to lure in greedy people such as myself) and they had packaged items in the take away fridge that were ridiculously expensive e.g. a cup of fruit salad for nearly £5. 

However, when we looked through the menus during our wait that the waitress who greeted us at the door had handed us, the prices for the breakfast items we planned to get were pretty much in line with or even cheaper than other cafés we'd been to previously so that was fine.

It was a really nice change taking advantage of the fact this place was a Patisserie and ordering ourselves something sweet before we got our breakfast. My pain au chocolat was toasted lightly so when it got to the table it was warm and the chocolate was deliciously gooey. 
Gary really enjoyed his blueberry muffin as well saying that the blueberries were very full and tasty, and didn't all congregate in the middle of the muffin as is prone to happen with other blueberry muffins. 

For the prices, we were both satisfied with our portions. I think mine seemed expensive initially but as it contains salmon, it's not really that surprising. 
Gary's breakfast had very full portions and tasted very good, though he said it could have done with some sauce, which we were not offered. Also he felt he was given too many mushrooms but that's just madness - how can you have TOO MANY mushrooms!? I would've helped him out no problem if he'd offered, sheesh!

Everything was beautifully presented though Gary felt the poached eggs were "too perfect", hence the random egg quote preceding our review. I personally thought they looked amazingly cylindrical so I was happy. 
The biggest let down was that when we were given the bill, our waitress (who had been very polite and friendly despite the lunch rush) said "There's no rush, just pay when you're ready" only, we were ready to pay right away but she disappeared to the other side of the café and was chatting to colleagues for over 10 minutes. I'm not the kind of person who is comfortable flagging down the staff or gesturing them over from 20 feet away because to me, it feels rude and I also thought that she would check back on us considering we had asked for the bill. 
Eventually Gary nodded her over and we paid. 

We still left a tip because despite that wait at the end, I couldn't fault the rest of her service. I'd definitely go back here - the food was delicious and I'd be keen to go back even to just get a cake and a tea.

My friend Ashley - who nominated this place, has bought us many different cakes at various points in her career with Patisserie Valerie and they're all so amazingly gooey and tasty and mmmm, I need to go back and eat some cake. 

A very nice treat after a bit of a breakfast hiatus; would definitely recommend. 

What’s next: Our next nomination is the Ship on the Shore, on the Shore (of course) nominated by our supervisor Strevs.

Breakfast Nomination #4 - the Southern on Clerk Street

Nomination #3 - the Southern on Clerk Street

Nominated by Simon Messer, an old college of mine

Originally reviewed on July 5th, 2015

"Is that a sympathy sausage?"

His score: 3.5/6
My score: just ok in terms of breakfast but would definitely go back for dinner or lunch

He ate: "blueberry pancakes" with maple syrup and crème fraîche (£5) with a pot of English breakfast tea (£2.50).
I ate: the Southern Breakfast (essentially a big, full cooked breakfast with all the usuals) (£8) and also a tea (£2.50)
Total cost: £18

Our pros: friendly service upon arrival; nice layout; reasonable prices; orange juice comes with full cooked breakfast; complimentary bourbon with tea, and mostly decent food.
Our Cons: extremely quiet waiter who served us after we sat down; bitter tasting tea; not a huge selection on the breakfast menu, and Gary was very disappointed as his pancakes were cold when served and he expected/would've preferred them to be hot.

Our experience: All in all a reasonably pleasant experience but nothing extraordinary and for some reason our breakfast was briefly interrupted by a couple slow-dancing and singing along to "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" on their way out the door after their own breakfast. Ok then.

I personally feel like this place was lacking a little in terms of breakfast but I have to highlight that the menu for lunch and dinner was actually huge and had many varied choices. I've also heard a lot of good things about this place so I would be quick to return for a meal other than breakfast.

When we arrived the waitress who greeted us was friendly and funny but we didn't really see her again after we sat down as we then got served by a waiter who talked so quietly I needed Gary to translate for me.

He whispered something about whether we needed sugar when he delivered our tea, though I felt like the sugar should've just come with the tea - what is with places rationing sugar like it's WW2 again!? Though when he did bring the sugar, it came in quite a cute little tin - though one that had a design probably literally from WW2 era.

The tea tasted a little bitter to me - even with the sugar! And for some reason none of the hot drinks seemed to appear on the menu for the place so I didn't know what prices/options there were and I really don't like when you don't know what your options are or how much they cost - what's the point in having menus otherwise?

My breakfast was tasty enough and filling, but nothing special compared to most cooked breakfasts you would get elsewhere.

Gary was let down that his breakfast was cold so it was obvious the pancakes weren't freshly made and also that the "blueberry pancakes" as advertised were actually just cold pancakes with blueberries sprinkled on top as an afterthought as opposed to something akin to a blueberry muffin with blueberries immersed and cooked within the batter. A little bit of false advertising there I think, hmm!

He did say the crème fraîche was really tasty though and I donated a sausage and black pudding to Gary so his breakfast wasn't so piddly, hence the "sympathy sausage" quote.

I will say that this place had an exciting looking menu for other meals and lots of choice for alcoholic beverages if you were to go back later in the day.
They also did snacky things while you waited for your food so if you wanted to order a wee bowl of spicy popcorn or olives for about £2 each then you could have something to nibble on waiting for your main meal.

Gary and I agreed we'd go back in a heartbeat for other meals but in terms of breakfast, this place fell a little flat and it would've been nice if the waiter who served us could've spoken above a whisper as my wizened old ears couldn't pick up a fucking word he said!

Still, this place was miles above McDonald's and I didn't feel like vomiting all over myself after so that was nice change from the last nomination to say the least.

What’s next: Our next nomination is Patisserie Valerie, nominated by my oldest and dearest friend Ashley.

Breakfast Nomination #3 - McDonald's on Princes Street

Breakfast nomination #3 - McDonald's on Princes Street. 

Nominated by our former colleague, Weebl. 

Originally reviewed on June 28th, 2015 

"Fuck you, Weebl!"

His score: 0.5/6 
My score: *dry heaves*

He ate: a bacon and egg McMuffin (£3.39) (though actually ordered a double sausage and egg McMuffin) and a breakfast tea (99p). Food came with a hash brown as a "meal". 
I ate: a bacon, egg and "cheese" bagel (£2.09), also with the hash brown in the meal and a tea (99p)
Total cost: £7.46

Our pros: quick food; cheap; lots of seats, and "tea" "condiments" supplied.
Our Cons: lacklustre service; disgusting food i.e. stringy bacon and plastic-like processed cheese; flavourless tea; depressing atmosphere; useless staff, and they got Gary's order wrong.

Our experience: So, for obvious reasons Gary and I were extremely sceptical about doing this nomination, hence why we put it off for a fortnight. 

Also because we knew they stopped serving breakfast at 10:30am, the idea of getting up that early on a Sunday to eat a fricking McDonald's was not the most appealing of ideas BUT WE FUCKING DID IT. 

The entire experience was everything we thought it would be and more, i.e. disgusting, depressing and made us contemplate our poor life decisions that had led us to that point. 

The staff at McDonald's (unsurprisingly for 10am on a Sunday) looked like they were ready for death, any time, any way just preferably soon.

The guy mixed up Gary's food order though I'm not sure how hard it is to get two small orders right when we were the only customers in the place. 

The food was really disgusting and the processed cheese made me feel sick. 
The bacon was stringy and fatty and the tea just tasted like hot water as all the sugar seeped to the bottom and glued itself to the bottom of the cup, stubbornly refusing to mix with the McDonald's "tea". 

The milk supplied came in a plastic tube and looked like cloudy water. 

I couldn't even finish my food and felt sick whilst eating it. Hell, I feel sick looking back at the images. 


Thankfully we've now got this nomination over and done with so we will NEVER, EVER have to do this again. 

I would NOT recommend McDonald's breakfast - it's cheap but it's cheap for good reason.

All we could think of whilst sadly munching our flat McMuffins was how the hell did Morgan Spurlock eat this shit 3 times a day, every day for 30 days? 
If I knew I had to go back and eat lunch and dinner there today, I'd rather stay at home and starve. 

What’s next:  the Southern, nominated by Simon Messer.

Breakfast Nomination #2 - Cross & Corner in Canonmills

Breakfast nomination #2 - Cross & Corner in Canonmills
2nd recommendation by my Assistant Manager, Ally. 

Originally review on June 14th 2015

"Imagine if humans laid eggs." 

His score: 4.8/6
My score: inoffensive but expensive

He ate: a "full" cooked breakfast for (£10!!!) and English Breakfast tea for (£2.50!!!)
I ate:  the exact same (!!!)
Total cost: £25 (!!!)

Our pros: decent food; good service, though nothing special; really nice layout and Victorian-style décor (cornicing etc and Gary liked the milk bottle lights); sugar and sauce brought to the table, and the place was in a nice area.
Our Cons: it was really expensive for what we got; some of the food was a little salty and other parts bland; nothing stood out about the place, and the service was good but nothing remarkable or special - just sufficient.

Our experience: There's not a huge amount to say about this place.

The food was nice, though for £10 the portions were very little.

My bacon was (imo) overcooked and my poached eggs were a little bland and the yolks not runny enough. However, Gary said his poached eggs were great and could maybe even rival his mum's (sorry Louise, if you're reading this!).

We were given brioche with our breakfast which would've been a nice touch but it was very dry and could've done with a little butter with it to make it a bit nicer.

We each got a pot of tea but £2.50 each seemed a lot and for the entire breakfast £25 seems shocking as we've had full breakfasts with tea before for less than half that price.

The place looked nice and the service was fine but nothing really stood out about this place.
Had it been a little cheaper, I think I would've enjoyed it a bit more and it, like many of the places we've been to, seemed like it would be nice to return to for dinner at some stage.

Afterwards, Gary and I both agreed that had we been in that area again for breakfast and had to pick between this place, Blue Bear Café and Urban Angel then we would pick Blue Bear again.

This place is not the kind of place that I would go out of my way to recommend to people but it wasn't bad either, hence it's "inoffensive" review.

Oh, and the review's opening quote was the stimulating conversation I was initiating with Gary whilst we munched our poached eggs.

What’s next: Next time we will be reviewing McDonald's breakfast menu on Princes Street, as nominated by Weebl. Aye, cheers. If only I wasn't too proud to back down from a challenge....

Breakfast Nomination #1 - Urban Angel on Hanover Street

Breakfast nomination #1 - Urban Angel on Hanover Street 
nominated by my Assistant Manager, Ally.

Originally reviewed on June 7th, 2015

 "It's party time!!" (this quote will have relevance later in the review) 

His score: 4.5/6
My score: good food, poor service

He ate: French toast with bacon and maple syrup (£9!!!) and English Breakfast tea (£2.70!!!)
I ate: Eggs Benedict on English Muffins with smoked salmon (£7) and also an English Breakfast tea (£2.70)
Total cost: £21.40(!!!)

Our pros: very tasty food and nice tea; they had sugar on the tables(!), and the café had a nice layout and atmosphere.
Our Cons: service lacked or was too much at times; I practically had to oil myself up to squeeze into the table they sat us at; the toilets were minuscule, and everything was quite expensive for what we got.

Our experience: So, I was put off within 30 seconds of going into the café as we wandered over to the "please wait here to be seated" sign to the right of the tills and a sullen-faced American employee pretty much barked "Yes?" at us as if our presence in the café was somehow unusual or confusing for him.
I asked if we could have a table for two and he gruffly told us it would be a 10-15 minute wait so we said "ok".... then he almost aggressively told us to take a seat.

After a few minutes they said they had a table for us and we had to scuttle after them as they sped through the few slightly confusing hallways (one of them mirrored, yes this is confusing for me) to our seats where I practically fell over the table leg trying to squeeze into the cramped seats.

The waitress took our drink order immediately before we'd even had a chance to look at the menu (we always get tea for our breakfasts so it was ok this time though had we wanted to browse first this would've been annoying) then disappeared and no one returned to take our food order.

Maybe 5-10 minutes later, as we were still waiting for our tea, the same waitress approached us and basically said "I'm not going to take your food order yet because we've got a lot of order dockets up already" then walked off again.
I couldn't understand why they didn't just take our order then explain there would be a wait due to it being busy. Outright delaying to take our order just seemed rude and we would've fully understood if they just told us there'd be a wait for our food after they took our order.

Anyway, the waitress eventually returned again a few minutes later after deciding it was now ok to take our order and declared "Ok, it's party time!" (everyone here was very American and this enthusiasm over breakfast is very distressing for me).

While our waitress was hideously over-enthusiastic and declaring everything was 'awesome' with a big smile on her face, the waiter who had 'greeted' us at the door was walking around throwing menus on the tables and delivering lattes to customers with a face like those people had wronged him at some point in his life. What the hell was going on here?

 The food arrived after not too long a wait and both Gary and I enjoyed our respective meals. I couldn't fault mine at all and all Gary said was his could've done with some added fruit, like, say, a banana (*cough cough* like Roseleaf café *cough cough*) and that the syrup made it a little *too* sweet.
Also, we both agreed the prices were ridiculously high for what we got but I think this café is into the organic and locally sourced scene so that does tend to add a bit of price on.

Ultimately, the food was good, though pricey; the service was too lacking on one side (though the waiter enthusiastically said goodbye to us when we left...) and too much on the other "IT'S PARTY TIME!", but we both agreed we'd go back for the food if we were in the area and I would recommend going at a less busy time and stay clear of the dour-faced bearded man (that is the waiter, not Gary).

What’s next:  Our next nomination is also from Ally. The Cross and Corner in Canonmills.