Shebeen - Edinburgh, City of

GIANT portions! And the cutest sweet little waitress! She was so accommodating and joking around with us. This is just around the corner for me and I never noticed it was actually a South African restaurant. Nice decor! I took the Surf and Turf starter thinking to save some space for dessert, but with the chips added I was more than full. My friends had ribs and burgers which were HUGE and super tasty. You definitely get your money's worth! This was a real surprise and somewhere we will go back for sure!

Visiting Edinburgh? You MUST try Shebeen. Amazing Saffer food. When more than one friend raved thusly, we decided, cool, let 's dedicate one meal of our Scottish holiday to South African food. And we were glad we did. From the assortment of the grilled meats to the succulent Bunny Chow to the beautifully plated Beef Reef to the decadent Malva pudding, every course was perfection.

Absolutely amazing! The staff is friendly, the steak is incredible, and they even have Mrs Balls Chutney! What more could you want?

I lived around the corner from Shebeen for absolutely ages, and only tried its offering a week before I moved house. Of course, after finally eating there, I had to return for one more feed before the big move. Twice in one week! The food here is South African-inspired and be warned, the plates of food are enormous on both the tastiness front and the portion sizing. I had the boerwurst the first visit, which was an enormous sausagey hot dog type affair I only just managed to polish off. Second visit I enjoyed some seriously amazing chicken wings. Service is really friendly and the waitress we had on both occasions was pleasant and helpful. It's reasonably priced too and there are several South African beers to choose from so I was happy as a clam. New favourite haunt for meaty munching.

This place is BEYOND amazing. I 'm a bit late in reviewing, but I figured better late than never! We came here for my birthday dinner, and we decided THAT NIGHT that we 'll be returning for the hubby 's in a couple of months! First off--I have no idea what other reviewers are talking about in regards to the waitstaff--they were beyond sweet to us! (Translated things, explained things, were more than friendly about us having just walked in without making reservations... and didn 't make fun of me when I asked if I could eat the funny-looking berry that came with our dessert. Waitstaff delightful. And the food.. oh the food. I actually remembered to finally write this review because I caught myself randomly craving what we ate there! To start off, we had the fanagalo, which is essentially a whole bucket of meats of all sorts. It looks like a pricey menu option, but 1 a South African friend had told me to get it, and 2 it was SO worth it. They really could charge so much more for that much meat, let alone the flavor! It was all delicious. We spent the next five minutes after eating it all debating over why different pieces were the best ones. Ugh. It 's a good thing I don 't live a closer walking distance to this place, or I 'm pretty sure this menu item would end up being our easy dinner at least once a month. (And we really don 't even eat out once a month to being with, so that 's saying a lot. For the main course, we had the Moerby poytjie and the Impangeni seabream. They were both AMAZING. We 'd never had flavors like these before, and I 'm legitimately sad that we 've been deprived of this experience for the first 25 years of our lives. If the rest of African food is anything like these dishes, I NEED MORE. And again, the quantities they gave us were ridiculous. We went home with leftovers, despite having stuffed ourselves nearly to the point of discomfort. So yeah, prices are a little higher than what we usually dine out on, but 1 it 's a steakhouse, and most of the stuff they serve is straight up MEAT, and 2 OMG IT 'S SO GOOD and 3 wow that 's a lot of food. Even though we were SO FULL, I had to have dessert. Because dessert. I got the melktert based on the waitress 's suggestion, and I 'm so delighted that I did! Despite the potentially underwhelming idea of a Milk tart (not to me, but maybe to some , it was such a rich, wonderful dessert. Joe, who was stuffed and is not that big of a dessert guy, ended up having more than half of it, he loved it so much. I know I want to try the peppermint crisp torte or the amarula malva pudding next time, but I 'm not sure we 'll be able to choose one of those over having another go at the Melktert! Yummmmmmm... So yeah. This restaurant? Awesome. The people here? Awesome. The food? Godly. Me? Drooling. And chewing on my shirt. (Classy, right? That 's how hungry I am, thinking about this place. Go here. It 's too pricy for just a casual drop-in if you 're a student like me, but seriously, the next time you have an excuse, go. It 's not really quite EXPENSIVE for the amount of food they give, and it 's totally worth. Already looking forward to the next birthday in January! Also: cool points for the awesome decor and music. It 's just a pleasure to be in this place. Refreshing, in its special-ness.