New Town
39 rooms on the Edinburgh list
This is where the city drinks. Panda & Sons hides a freezer laboratory behind a false barbershop front on Queen Street, Bramble Bar & Lounge runs a basement under a dry cleaner a few doors along and takes no bookings, and The Scotch Malt Whisky Society codes its casks by flavor from a Georgian house on the same street. The cask pubs are Victorian and nobody gutted them: Cafe Royal holds a CAMRA Three Star interior, Guildford Arms has ten fonts under a canopied island counter, and Kay’s Bar has taken its branch Real Ale Quality Award four times since 2021. Eating splits by street. Hanover Street holds tipo on the first floor and Papii for brunch below it, Thistle Street holds Noto, and Broughton Street runs a whole meal on its own with Lucky Yu, Pickles and The Chippy by Spencer in three blocks. LYLA sits above all of it on Royal Terrace with 28 covers and a star. Cardinal and The Table are the other two no-choice rooms here, and both of them sell out as single units.
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Here, for
Known for, here
The cheap pint in an old room6 here
- Kay’s Bar — Three regular casks and three rotating guests pour in a converted Victorian wine merchant the size of a front room.
- The Oxford Bar — CAMRA's surveyors call this the least altered pub in Edinburgh, and the front bar seats about four people.
- Guildford Arms — Ten fonts draw on up to eight Scottish breweries, under the ornate Victorian ceiling nobody ever took out.
- The Black Cat — Two cask lines change constantly and both come from small Scottish brewers, in a cheap New Town room with folk sessions.
- The Kenilworth — One mahogany island bar stands under a double-height room, and CAMRA's surveyors are the reason the building is listed category A.
- The Standing Order — Jeff drinks here for the cheap round and the room, which is a former bank hall on George Street.
Whisky bars3 here
- The Scotch Malt Whisky Society — The Society bottles single casks at cask strength and codes each one by flavor, and Kaleidoscope pours more than 200 of them a month.
- Johnnie Walker Princes Street — The Explorers' Bothy Bar holds 150 rare bottlings drawn from Diageo's 28 Scottish distilleries, and the cellar tasting pulls whisky straight from the cask.
- The Black Cat — An Ardbeg embassy, and a special Croftengea bottling was released to mark the bar's thirteenth anniversary.
One set menu, built on Scottish produce2 here
Shellfish, and the boats that land it3 here
- LYLA — The langoustine course is the one the Michelin inspector names, and it moves with what the boats land.
- Cardinal — The lobster and crab come from Belhaven, and Gaby Soutar read the cherry smoked lobster as a prawn cocktail by way of Cullen skink.
- Cafe Royal — Around a thousand Cumbrae rock oysters a week come off the Firth of Clyde, opened to order, and August trebles that.
Haggis, past the Burns supper2 here
- Cafe Royal — The kitchen makes its own haggis rather than buying it in, having taken up the idea after eating the version at Stravaigin.
- Howies Waterloo Place — Neeps, tatties and a thyme jus come to GBP 9.95, and the kitchen offers a Glengoyne 12 alongside it for GBP 6.95. The vegan version is priced and written as its own separate dish, so the traditional one is the meat one.
Cullen skink3 here
- Café St Honoré — Neil Forbes builds his on Peterhead smoked haddock and heritage potatoes, then browns a blitzed cheddar and herb crust over it under the grill.
- The Magnum — The Cullen skink is on the card twice, at GBP 11.90 as a starter and GBP 18.90 at main size, so the kitchen expects people to make a meal of it.
- Howies Waterloo Place — GBP 10.25 for smoked haddock, leek, potato and cream, served with focaccia off the morning's bake, and Howies puts it among the dishes that stay on the card when the season turns everything else over.
The fish supper2 here
- The Chippy by Spencer — Won Best Team at the Scottish Fish and Chip Awards in 2025 and reached the final in two more categories the same year.
- L'Alba D'Oro — Haddock comes alla Romana here, fried with sage and onions, which is a preparation no other counter in the city offers.
Basement cocktail bars2 here
- Panda & Sons — Transcend runs sixteen drinks across four chapters of freezing technique, in a basement behind a false barbershop front.
- Lucky Liquor Co — Thirteen bottles, thirteen drinks, and the whole menu rebuilt from scratch every thirteen weeks.
Restaurants21
Panda & Sons
Destination · Bar · New Town · $$
booking essential
The current menu, Transcend, is sixteen drinks built over five years of freezer work, and its first chapter freezes the water out of a spirit and swaps the ice for another flavor.
LYLA★
Solid · Restaurant · New Town · $$$$
booking essential
In October 2024 Mark Donald, who cooks at two Michelin stars, ate here and said he would be surprised if Stuart Ralston did not get a star soon; the Star arrived at the 2025 ceremony.
tipoBib
Solid · Restaurant · New Town · $$
book ahead
The room takes its name from the flour: tipo 00, the fine Italian mill grade that pasta doughs are built on, and the kitchen rolls and cuts the pasta in the building.
CardinalMichelin
Solid · Modern Scottish tasting menu · New Town · $$$$
booking essential
The beef sauce arrives as a lit tea light of tallow, and you pour it over the meat once the flame is out.
Little CapoMichelin
Solid · Restaurant · New Town · $$$
booking essential
It opened on Howe Street in November 2024 from a partnership including Stuart McCluskey of the Bon Vivant group, and within a year The Scotsman's critic had it among her picks of forty-three new rooms.
NotoBib!
Solid · Restaurant · New Town · $$
book ahead
One dessert, miso and chocolate, has been singled out by a critic in 2019, by the Michelin Inspector in 2025 and by a reviewer again in 2025, which is six years of a kitchen repeating itself on purpose.
Paz Taqueriajust added?
Solid · Mexican · New Town · $$
book ahead
The kitchen makes the corn tortillas in the room, and they reach the table straight off the grill.
Thamel Edinburgh
Solid · Nepalese · New Town · $$
book ahead
The Scotsman's critic ordered the most expensive main on the menu and the cheapest one side by side, and gave her headline to the £14 curry.
Lucky YuMichelin
Listed · Restaurant · New Town · $$
book ahead
Michelin added this room in an April 2026 monthly round rather than at the ceremony, so it is in the 2026 guide without appearing in the guide's February roster.
The Chippy by Spencer
Listed · Fish and chips · New Town · $
walk-in
Spencer Wilson ran the kitchens for the Vittoria restaurant group before he took the old Cafe Rapido site on Broughton Street in November 2020 and put himself behind a fryer.
Vessel
Listed · Bar · New Town · $$
walk-in
Pilot brewed in Leith for twelve years before opening a bar, and when they did they put it in the New Town.
The Magnum
Listed · Restaurant · New Town · $$$
book ahead
A two-course table d'hote runs until 5pm, Monday to Saturday, and it turns a room with a £34 fillet on the card into a £25 lunch.
The Dome
Listed · Bar · New Town · $$$
book ahead
The Commercial Bank of Scotland used to run its headquarters out of this room, and the banking hall is now the bar.
Badger & Co
Listed · Restaurant · New Town · $$$
book ahead
The bar and dining room occupy the former home of Kenneth Grahame, who wrote The Wind in the Willows.
Howies Waterloo Place
Listed · Scottish · New Town · $$
book ahead
Howies keeps cullen skink and traditional haggis on the card whatever else the season turns over, at GBP 10.25 and GBP 9.95, in a Georgian hall of 1815 under Calton Hill.
L'Alba D'Oro
Listed · Restaurant · New Town · $
walk-in
You can have your fish alla Romana here, fried with sage and onions, which is not an option most chip counters offer.
Lucky Liquor Co!
Listed · Bar · New Town · $$
walk-in
Thirteen bottles of spirits, thirteen cocktails, and the whole thing torn up and rebuilt every thirteen weeks, in a Queen Street basement with records on and a pool table downstairs.
Knoops?
Listed · Dessert · New Town · $
walk-in
The price on the board tracks the origin of the cocoa. An 80 per cent house blend is £5.80 for a regular and a 68 per cent Madagascar single origin is £7.90.
Urban Angel!
Listed · Restaurant · New Town · $$
walk-in
A working Edinburgh bartender picked this Hanover Street breakfast room in a 2023 trade guide, and the kitchen has held a failing hygiene rating since February 2026.
Hope Izakaya
Listed · Japanese izakaya · New Town · $$
walk-in
An izakaya trading on Queensferry Street since 2023, and nobody has written about it.
The Table
Listed · Restaurant · New Town · $$$$
booking essential
The whole restaurant is one table of ten, two chefs cook for it, and the night runs as a single sitting.
Markets1
Bonnie & Wild's Scottish Marketplace
Listed · Scottish · New Town · $$
walk-in
Julie Lin folds Malaysian tacos at Tacos Lah, Gary Maclean works Scottish seafood at Creel Caught, and the 400 seats between them will take a party of eight with no booking.
Pubs & cask8
Cafe Royaljust added
Solid · Pub · New Town · $$
book ahead
A tavern has traded on this corner since 1826, and two hundred years on the bar still gets through about a thousand Cumbrae rock oysters a week.
Kay’s Barjust added
Solid · Pub · New Town · $
walk-in
The local CAMRA branch has given this bar its Real Ale Quality Award four times since 2021, and that award is decided on members' beer scores, which makes it a measure of cellar work.
The Oxford Bar?
Solid · Cask ale pub · New Town · $
walk-in
CAMRA's surveyors call this the least altered pub in Edinburgh, and the front bar seats about four people.
Guildford Arms!
Listed · Pub · New Town · $$
walk-in
The Stewart family has run this bar since it opened in 1896, and they still put on two ten-day beer festivals a year plus fifteen smaller ones, each pouring four beers from a single brewery at one price.
The Ox
Listed · Pub · New Town · $$$
book ahead
Gaby Soutar ate the ox cheek here in December 2014 and called it black as soot; the kitchen still sends it out twelve years later, at twice the price.
The Black Cat?
Listed · Whisky and folk-session pub · New Town · $
walk-in
A special bottling of heavily peated Croftengea marked the bar's thirteenth anniversary, and the emptied Pedro Ximenez wood behind it went on to age the owner's own apple spirit.
The Kenilworth?
Listed · Cask ale pub · New Town · $$
walk-in
One mahogany island bar under a double-height room, and CAMRA's surveyors are the reason the building is now listed category A.
The Standing Order
Listed · Pub · New Town · $
walk-in
A Wetherspoon pouring in the Union Bank of Scotland's grade A banking hall on George Street, and Jeff's own call for the big cheap central room with atmosphere.
Whisky2
The Scotch Malt Whisky Society!
Solid · Whisky bar · New Town · $$$
book ahead
Every bottle the Society sells hides its distillery behind a number, a rule set in 1983 when consultant Russell Sharp told founder Pip Hills the distillery names were trademarked and could never go on a label.
Johnnie Walker Princes Street?
Listed · Whisky attraction with a rooftop cocktail bar · New Town · $$$
book ahead
Mr Lyan Studio set the brief for the rooftop cocktail list, and Scott Smith of Blank Plate Creative runs the kitchen underneath it.
Cocktails2
Nightcap!
Listed · Cocktail bar · New Town · $$
walk-in
The door goes members-only at midnight and the room runs on to three.
Pickles
Listed · Bar · New Town · $
walk-in
The basement everyone remembers was 56a Broughton Street, under L'Escargot Bleu; the bar has grown into larger rooms at street level at number 60, and the boards of cured meat, cheese and house pickles made the move with it.
Wine1
Good Brothers Wine Cellars
Solid · Wine bar · New Town · $$
walk-in
Every Thursday they open something old out of the cellar and pour it by the glass at cost price.
Coffee3
Cafe St Honorė
Solid · Restaurant · New Town · $$$$
book ahead
Whole sides of venison, half a pig and legs of beef come through the door, and the chef's stated reason is that it is cheaper that way.
Lowdown Coffee
Solid · Coffee · New Town · $
walk-in
The house mineralizes its water three different ways and tastes every incoming coffee against all three before choosing which water to brew that bean with.
Papii
Listed · Brunch · New Town · $
walk-in
In April 2025 a news agency reported this cafe was leaving Hanover Street by 6 September; sixteen months on, the hygiene register, Companies House and the cafe's own site all still put it at number 101.
Bakes & sweet1
Archipelago Bakery?
Listed · Organic sourdough · New Town · $
walk-in
No proving oven, no warm water, and the yeasted dough is mixed the day before it bakes.
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