please note - reviews on this site are purely the opinion of site visitors, so don't take them too seriously.
Grand Wetherspoons that should be visited for the architecture alone. High quality beer at bargain prices.
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In for a drink and a meal yesterday. Around 1.30 and only half full. More people standing at the bar trying to get served than there was seated. Servers being very slow.
Several real ales on as it was during their ale festival. Many people were seen trying the three small glasses for the price of a pint.
It was curry Thursday. I wanted a Beef Curry but in the hour and a half since they had started to serve lunches they had run out of Beef. Not a good start.
However once we eventually got served the experience improved. Lovely premises and a nice cross section of customers with both the beer and food being good.
Long walk to the toilets though.
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Very large spoons that used to be a counting house for the Union Bank of Scotland.
Wonderfully grand building with original mouldings and cornices.
18 pumps, serving a wide range of beers including a good selection of the festival beers.
Quick service for food and drink on a Saturday morning, plenty of staff available.
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Impressive building with the usual Wetherspoon's offers. Beer was fine and my steak was actually pretty good. Only one downside - I was pestered by a local drunk who would not go away even after being ushered out by the staff. A one-off experience I hope.
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Busy pub with various ales @�2.30 pint tho Deuchars is �1.65 pint. Good range of beer and the large scottish breakfast does set u up for the day as advised below. 7/10.
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Impressive former bank - worth going into for the place alone. That said, it's actually a very decent Wetherspoons in its own right. The beer in varied and cheap - the real ales were �1.75 a pint, and this at a time where most other pubs in the centre average around �3.20. Try the large Scottish breakfast at a tad under �4 - it will set you up for the day.
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A better than usual Wetherspoons. It was packed when I was in, but I was served a pint of Bitter & Twisted quickly enough. Beer was good.
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Huge gorgeous building,busy but PLENTY of bar staff which is normally unheard of for JDW! Ale was well kept and @ �2.30 a pint not bad value at all, 8/10
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It's a big city Wetherspoons with all that that suggests, but the building has a nice interior and the staff are OK. It has to be said that a good pint of Deuchar's can be purchased for little more than half the price of many "better" Edinburgh pubs. Yesterday we noticed that we were 2 days too early for the CAMRA Scottish ales festival just down the street, which would be followed by a Caledonian Brewery festival in the pub itself - bad timing! Pub was noisy with the South Africa-France World Cup match on the big screen.
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Impressive building with spoons usual offering. Busy but service ok. Yes it is a bit of a walk to the gents(further for ladies). God atmosphere. Amy Winehouse talking to superman & a banana!
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I think some people are on a windup here. This is one of the busiest pubs in Edinburgh from shortly after it opens until late at night. Trying to get served is a nightmare and when you need to visit the loo be prepared for a long long walk.
To be fare it is a lovely building with plenty of real ale choice Food, for a Wetherspoons, is well prepared and normally you do not have to wait too long.
The big negative is, as has been said before, getting served.
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Things we noticed...
1. Guest Real ale now about �2 a pint. Caledonian 80/- �1.95, Deuchars 99p...
2. Service is very friendly.
3. very popular with foreign tourists and locals alike
4. Rarley crowded, brilliant atmosphere
5. Beer choice is fantastic - The bar has 18 handpumps, some Scottish breweries, some from england, some from japan, the USA and Australia. Casque Mark and beer always spot on!
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Late comment from August. Enjoyed my Sulwath and Caledonian beers in this spoons pub.
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No less than 16 active hand pumps, most of the ales to be found in the program for Wetherspoons real ale festival, Nov. 08. We had a great time drinking different kind of real ales from 1/3 pint glass.
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I have to say - as a non-JDW fan - that this pub is very good. 8 ales on, and the 2 I had were well-kept, particularly the Red Rogue. Less than �2 a pint too. I didn't eat but the food looked well prepared and was reasonably priced. Lovely building, too. I would be happy to come back.
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This pub has the greatest potential of perhaps any Wetherspoons, and is such a let-down.
1. Real ale now at �2 a pint. Previously I could put up with the cr�p atmosphere for �1.59 but for an extra 80p I'd now rather drink somewhere else.
2. Service is TERRIBLE, bar staff plentiful and incompetent.
3. people queue up in lines behind tills to be served sometimes, foreign tourists who get p!ssed off when you walk straight to the bar and order. Bar staff do nowt about it.
4. Always overcrowded.
5. Beer choice is terrible - always the same old tired Scottish breweries, putting out their own version of a 4.1% 80/- or pale ale. The bar has 18 handpumps, of which 6 are usually duplicates of other beers, the rest are all from the same Scottish breweries, never a dark one, never a string one, a mild, a stout, a porter or an interesting one from outside the border. There is not enough real ale choice in Scotland for The Standing Order to continue with this silly policy.
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Good pint of bitter in a good atmosphere as in common with all pubs in Scotland, it it now mercifully "SMOKE Free".
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Surprised to see the big screen tvs! I understood Wetherspoons to be devoid of this sort of thing , while I cant complain about the good range of cask beers, or the speed of service, the presence of these irritating screens and the VERY smoky atmosphere spoiled the experience for me!
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Thank god for Wethers!Got a few pints of tasty �1.59 stout during the beer festival before getting back to the �2.40-�2.70 pints in the old town. The haggis neeps & tatties was very good as well.1 main bar & 3 smaller rooms-well situated for having a stop off on a shopping trip.
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Should be called the moon due to the lack of any atmosphere. But at the prices it would be silly to complain. Bar staff are not great, do not seem to care who gets served first, and yes, the toilets are miles away!
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Good for a few cheap drinks and watching sport on the massive screen. It lacks atmosphere, and there are not too many seats on the go in the bar area.
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Not at all bad for a city centre Wetherspoons but, as with all Wetherspoon pubs, the low prices are the only real attraction. There are plenty of better places within easy walking distance.
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Really only usefull for (many) cheap drinks before going somewhere you'd actually like to be, food good, but theres not a lot of it and make sure you set off for the toilet about 10 minutes before you need to as it appears to be miles away...
Hugh - 25 Sep 2004 15:26 |
Cheap cask ale is a good plus point. If you want atmosphere, sit on the green leather couch at the top of the stairs to the toilet and guide the clients down (a long and tortuous journey). I like this pub. Try Wetherspoon's in Livingston for a good atmosphere on Saturday night - if you make it out alive!
KEITH TAIT - 27 Jun 2004 15:54 |
Amazing!
Pete - 7 May 2004 10:43 |
we all had a good night except becas curry came way too early then someone elses soup came really late!!!
anonymous - 2 Apr 2004 16:09 |
Needs music!
Jennifer - 17 Feb 2004 23:41 |
well it was very smoky and that is hard for us pure Canadians!! I liked the "hen night" crowd! The no-smoking library area was nice. But no music? How horrible? They should have a live Jazz Band--hire "Jazz Noir"- a great Canadian Jazz Band!
charlotte harvey - 11 Jan 2004 23:27 |
Dull as only a dull Wetherspoons can be
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A huge Wetherspoons conversion with high ceilings which was previously a Bank of Scotland building. Standard Wetherspoons fare and ambience.
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