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Dine - where the season is served on the plate.
- Sharon Wilson
- Apr 14
- 3 min read
Updated: 14 minutes ago
I have always enjoyed independent restaurants, distinct from street food trucks, chain restaurants, high-end establishments, and Michelin-starred venues.
While chain restaurants have improved their offerings considerably, and street food and Michelin have their place, I seek out the family-run, couple-owned, entrepreneurial, or partnership-driven neighborhood restaurants—places where you meet the owner on the way in and exchange pleasantries or where they come to your table to check on your food.
Reflecting on this, I realise, while on my way to Dine one sunny April evening, that it's because I favour experience and theatre over mere consumption. Passing a pizza truck, I appreciate its existence and would happily grab a slice en route. Food markets like Edinburgh Street Food and Bonnie and Wild tick many boxes; Michelin is an occasional treat, and I love what the hipster young bucks do.
But this evening, I am heading to a beautiful brasserie where I know the owners' ethos, where my friend knows some of the staff, and where I will be served plates of food overseen by an executive chef with a passion for Scottish seasonal produce.
Dine is the brainchild of Stuart Muir and Paul Brennan, a dynamic duo combining chef and hospitality business expertise. Stuart once had Michelin stars. Now they have four neighbourhood restaurants in Craiglockhart, Canonmills, Murrayfield and this flagship venue at Saltire Court in Edinburgh's theatreland.
We are welcomed with a glass of complimentary bubbles. Our names, as regular customers, have been flagged among the thousands of bookings they must be accommodating over four restaurants on a Friday night in Spring; a warm and welcoming gesture.
After nibbles, I enjoy roast chicken with peas à la française, new potatoes, and herb oil, while Kate has slow-cooked ox cheek with creamed mashed potato, buttered kale, Madeira jus, and crispy onions. Both dishes are from the market menu, which changes monthly, shaped by the seasons, and is £23.50 for two courses and £30.50 for three courses. My chicken dinner is a delicious plate of food complemented by a good glass of Italian white, and Kate says the beef is so tender it just falls apart. I am in a very happy place for a Friday night at the end of a long working week, and am about to be even happier.
We both savour our desserts. For Kate, it is baked rice pudding with caramelized pineapple, and for me, the stem ginger panna cotta is the wobbliest, creamiest I have had. It comes with perfectly al dente poached diced rhubarb and two delicate discs of buttery crisp shortbread. This is Spring on a plate!
Not only is the food heavenly, but the staff are friendly, the restaurant is warm and buzzing, and at no point, despite the busyness, are we prodded to chat less and free up our table. I recently visited another place with excellent food, but my party was interrupted every ten minutes, and I won’t be going back.
I don’t know whether Stuart Muir and Paul Brennan of Dine are familiar with Danny Meyer’s concept of Enlightened Hospitality, but the key is to put employees first. When you do that, Meyer argues, a virtuous circle is created where happy employees create happy customers. It starts with the emotional intelligence of staff and results in customers who have positive, happy experiences.
This is what you find in independent operations like Dine, where the investment is in the staff and the community. It is an investment in humans over numbers, and I hope such restaurants continue to prosper.
