The Edinburgh Blog

Dalry Road has a terrific selection of restaurants: Thai, Indian/Bangladeshi, Japanese, Italian and fish based. The lack of a steak house from that list is noticeable and this is the job the Sizzling Scot, by the side of the afore mentioned First Coast fish based restaurant, does very well indeed.

The Sizzling Scot is Scottish and it’s not afraid to state this in every way imaginable. Whether it be the painted Scottish flags on the restaurants exterior, the Scottish maps and pictures on the interior walls or the Scottish music playing through the sound system. If you’re still not convinced a peek at the menu and phrases such as “tatties” and “canna eat” should end your doubt!

I’ve been three times to the Sizzling Scot. My first visit is still my favourite as I think the quality of the Aberdeen Angus steak and it’s accompaniments were absolutely excellent. And that’s not saying my subsquent visits have been bad; just that I haven’t enjoyed them as much. Anyhow, everything you eat at The Sizzling Scot is huge! And I mean really huge. You have soup for starter and it’s enough to share; haggis, neeps and tatties for starter is a meal in it’s own right and one of The Sizzling Scots salads would be enough to keep a warren of rabbits fed for a week. You move onto the main courses and each of the steaks (and most of the other main courses such as burger, chicken with haggis, etc) come with a generous, sometimes daunting, serving of fries, new tatties or mashed tatties. If you like your meals big then a reservation at The Sizzling Scot is definately for you.

A leaflet accompanying the menu boldly states “We Don’t Do Ordinary”. It further states how all meals are freshly prepared, cooked to order and only Scottish suppliers with 100% traceability are used. And I have to say their steaks in particular are rather good. On my first visit I had 8oz Aberdeen Angus Sirloin Steak (£16.75), on my second I ate the 8oz Fillet steak (£19.95) and finally I plumped for the 16oz T-Bone Steak (£21.95). However, I’m sure this 16oz figure is largely due to the weight of the bone: so go for the fillet would be my advice. I always order my steak medium rare and the first two steaks were spot-on. However on my third visit the steak was not cooked properly: it was totally rare, and so were the other steaks my friends had ordered. We of course sent these meals back and before long we had our steaks back, cooked properly, and with an apology from our excellent waitress. I’m not sure why the steaks were served undercooked (perhaps a change in the kitchen or just one of those things) but I must commend the excellent, professional way our waitress dealt with this. And entirely unprompted by any of my group the waitress did not charge us for three deserts we ate (knocking about £12 off the bill). This was a great gesture and the fact that our steaks were served undercooked should not be enough to deter you from visiting the Sizzling Scot - I expect this to be a one off. Service is warm, friendly, attentive and totally effective.

Each steak is served with mushrooms, fried tomatoes and onion rings - and of course your choice of potato. I have to say that their fries do, to me, seem fairly ordinary. They’re the thin cut variety and have all the hallmarks of being mass produced and cooked from frozen. However the Sizzling Scots mashed potato is excellent. The cheese and spring onion variety I had on my last visit was delicious - the flavour was great and so was the texture. If eating a steak at the Sizzling Scot I think, for the best possible meal, you’ll need one of their sauces, that cost an additional £1.50, I think. Their barbecue and whisky sauces are particularly great accompaniments for the steak. The Sizzlin’ Scot also serve chargrilled chicken mains: chicken stuffed with haggis costs £11.95. My dining partner of my first visit had this chicken dish and it was another huge serving and made a nice main, helped by the nice sauce it was served in.

Starters are traditional, whether it be haggis, neeps and tatties (£4.75), musells or Scottish smoked salmon. If you have any room for deserts (presumably because you skipped the starter and main!) the cheesecake and bannoffee we tried was very good. The wine list has a few bottles to enjoy and beers are served by the bottle e.g. Corona or Budweiser.

So, Dalry Road needed a good steakhouse. And The Sizzling Scot, I think, delivers. I’d say it’s a premium brand of steakhouse, with Aberdeen Angus the meat of the moment. The menu at the Sizzlin’ Scot is borderline huge; it could be worth the Sizzling Scot looking at this again and allowing the chef to concentrate on a smaller selection that he can make absolutely excellent. As things stand though the dishes are generally very good and for a superbly filling meal in a nice restaurant, with great service, Edinburgh’s Sizzling Scot is a decent choice.