Rhubarb Restaurant, Prestonfield Hotel, Edinburgh

Rhubarb, the fine dining restaurant located at Prestonfield luxury boutique hotel, is one of three swanky Edinburgh dining venues owned by the highly creative restaurateur James Thomson. 

• Location: Hidden in a historic seventeenth-century building on the fringes of Royal Holyrood Park.
• The menu: Set and à la carte menus showcase the best of Scottish ingredients.
• What else is there: There’s a private dining room with its own romantic terrace. 
• Why go: It’s an adventure in indulgence, and worth it for the decadent surroundings alone.

The Space

As with Thomson’s other restaurants, The Witchery by the Castle and The Tower, his vision for Rhubarb was to offer diners not just exceptional food, wine and service, but decadence with a capital D. To dine here is to embark on a journey not just into a world of culinary creativity and excellence, but also one of extravagant luxury. At Prestonfield, the styling is lavish and the interiors are filled with art, antiques and wonderfully bold mismatched furnishings and fabrics. When your table is ready you will be led through to the restaurant, which is divided between two rooms of grand proportion in the centre of the house. It’s all rather magnificent. The lighting is low, the furnishings plush, the service super-attentive and the vibe romantic. On every table there’s a vase of flowers and, at night, candles flicker in silver candlesticks. Crisp, white linen tablecloths, gleaming cutlery and sparkling wine glasses on the tables stand out like beacons against the regal red, black and gold tones of the dining space. Huge golden chandeliers hang from the high ceilings and ancient faces stare out from gilt-framed oil paintings on the walls.

The Experience

A seasonal table d'hôte menu of three courses is offered at lunch and dinner. The wine list is more like a book than a list, with over 800 labels to choose from, so you need to allow a bit of time to go through it. Pleasingly, it includes a good selection of wines by the glass. Much of the produce on the menu is locally sourced. For example, when we stayed in January, dinner choices on the table d'hôte and à la carte menus included local venison (pan-fried haunch of roe deer, smoked celeriac purée, spiced chestnuts, January King cabbage and piquant venison jus); partridge (potted partridge, smoke ham crubeens, pineapple, black pudding and Dijon mustard aioli); Angus beef; Peterhead hake; Shetland salmon; and a good range of Scottish cheeses. Plus, from Prestonfield’s garden, citrus-poached outdoor rhubarb, champagne and raspberry sorbet with crystallised hazelnuts and meringue.

UltimateTravelMagazine.com Loves 

• Pre-dinner drinks are served in one of four drawing rooms, where log fires crackle and the most pressing tasks will be deciding which comfy old sofa to sink into, or who that is gazing down at you from the many portraits around the room.
• Particularly romantic are the cosy tables for two with views of Prestonfield’s gardens through huge windows framed by ornate tasselled curtains.
• It’s seriously cool - fine dining in a dream setting.

Insider Tips  

• Why is it called Rhubarb? That’s in honour of a former owner of Prestonfield, Sir James Dick, who first introduced rhubarb to Scotland in the 18th century. 
• Rhubarb is still grown in Prestonfield’s gardens and occasionally appears on the menu.

The Details

Rhubarb Restaurant is located at Priestfield Road, Edinburgh, Scotland, www.prestonfield.com.