I thought this busy Edinburgh street was a lunchtime desert, but this gem proved me wrong
I was in search of a city centre destination
We are so utterly spoiled in Edinburgh, when it comes to eating out.
So, why is it that when I’m in the centre of town on a weekend, I find myself flailing about frantically, when it comes to a casual and quick lunchtime pitstop?
I don’t want to be sucked into Pret for a jambon beurre, but it sometimes seems inevitable.
I hoped that the Japanese cafe, Yuzu, might be the solution.
It’s on Rose Street - a thoroughfare of orthopedic shoe shops, Celtic jewellery and olde world pubs. Pizza Pilgrims and Taco Libre are decent but, otherwise, I wouldn’t usually bother hunting for somewhere to eat around here.
But there is my destination, on a light and bright corner.
Although its look is as slick as a chain, this is a family-owned independent, from the team who also own poké restaurant Bowls on Edinburgh’s Forrest Road and the Miju Hotel and Restaurant on Hampton Road.
Their newest place, at two months old, still looks so box fresh, without a single scuff on the creme caramel-coloured interior.
The Frozen theme song is playing on the stereo, and there’s a noren curtain that hangs above the counter, with a single Japanese kanji character that simply translates as ‘tea’.
Their laminated menu is tacked to the wall and the speciality is poké bowls. If you’re not au fait, this rice-based dish usually features raw fish and has Japanese and Hawaiian origins.
It arrived in the UK as a healthy eating trend, a few years back.
I am generally a fan, but I often find they get boring and bland halfway through. Underseasoned and dry rice is usually my bugbear. Let’s see if this place can get me doing the hoke poké again. I went for the yuzu salmon bowl (£13.80) and it arrived, so neatly presented, on a wooden tray, along with his spicy kimchi poké (£13.80), plus chopsticks and wooden forks for those with less digit dexterity.
Both dishes were absolutely gorgeous. The rice was slightly warm, rather than fridge cold and pellet-y, and seasoned with a zingy and slightly hot yuzu wasabi gel-like sauce, plus codas of toasted sesame seed. On top, there were generous portions of cucumber moons, a slightly gummy centred half boiled egg, sweetcorn, radish, and about eight cola cube-sized pieces of raw salmon, all sprinkled with nori confetti and more seeds.
The dressing had been stirred in, so every bite, down to the bottom of the cardboard bowl had oodles of flavour.
He was initially a bit grumbly, because he’d forgotten to add protein, as Scottish salmon (£3.50) and chicken breast (£3.50) are available as extras.
Still, he clamped his geggy hole shut once he started scoffing, as it was such a bold dish of popping notes, from a robust garlicky kimchi, as well as cucumber, radish, crispy fried onion, chevrons of spicy mayo and sriracha, pickled ginger, togarashi chilli pepper, yuzu wasabi dressing and toasted sesame. He didn’t miss the meat element. I could smell the acidic spice from his dish, and it was making me drool.
The drinks are pretty expensive here, but they are fancier than your average. I had the iced matcha kinako honey latte (£7.50).
Apparently, they source the high grade matcha from Uji in Kyoto, and this was a sugary, yet fresh and earthy mixture, with a toasty tinge from the roasted soybean kinako powder.
He’d gone for the yuzu probiotic tea (£6.80) and there was more than a pint of this sunshine-coloured and juicily refreshing mixture, which featured a scoop of probiotic powder to repopulate his microbiome with upstanding bacterial citizens, or whatever else it’s supposed to do.
There was pudding, too. I didn’t realise that Japanese-style Basque cheesecake is a thing. Apparently, the Asian convenience store Lawson helped popularise it, with Baschee, aka their lighter and airier version of the traditional custardy dessert.
At Yuzu, they make various versions, including a hojicha or matcha, but we went for the pale yellow original (£6.80).
It was lovely - lightly caramelised, frothy and it slid down as easy as a greasy otter on a water park flume.
We also tried the special melon roll cake (£6.80), mainly because it looked so bonnie, with its pale yellow Easter bonnet shade and fruit cube fascinator. It was just like a Swiss roll, with a fluffy porous sponge and whipped cream in the middle. The Basque was more our thing.
I am very happy to have found this place. It seems a solution to my regular and sweaty traipsing around the city centre, looking for something healthy, quick and satisfying.
I’d probably just go straight for the bowl and Basque. That’s the perfect city centre lunch, right there.
Goodbye forever, Pret.
Yuzu, 127a Rose Street, Edinburgh, www.yuzu-edinburgh.com
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