Hard Rock Cafe Edinburgh

...dining out in was the Hard Rock Cafe, however the night we had planned to go, on arriving we were sent away due to the fact we would have to weight 1 hour fifteen minutes to get a table. It was around 7pm at this time and with young children in to we decided to give up and we went off to the neareset pizza joint.
Ever since the experience in New York, I have been determined to sample the food at the Hard Rock Cafe. I was totally oblivious ...
...we set eyes on THE HARD ROCK CAFE, we knew, without a doubt this was the place to eat out.

The Hard Rock Cafe is situated on George Street in Edinburgh and is extremely difficult to miss; a huge sign outside the door willing people in. As we were on foot, we didn't have to find a parking space, however if you do happen to drive then you may have to hunt around for a parking space. Usually the spaces in the street around are full, ... more

Three years ago, we stayed in New York for around 5 months. During our time here, we came across various different restaurants and cafe's and sampled many culinary delights, ranging from crab to the usual cheeseburgers and chips. One restaurant we were planning on dining out in was the Hard Rock Cafe, however the night we had planned to go, on arriving we were sent away due to the fact we would have to weight 1 hour fifteen minutes to get a table. It was around 7pm at this time and with young children in to we decided to give up and we went off to the neareset pizza joint.
Ever since the experience in New York, I have been determined to sample the food at the Hard Rock Cafe. I was totally oblivious to the fact there was one situated in Edinburgh, a fourty five minute drive or a 30 minute train ride from my house.

So a couple of weeks back, me, my mum and the two boys had enjoyed a family fun day in Edinburgh, shopping, sight seeing and taking lots of photo's of each other! We had just popped into a cafe for our lunch and had chosen a simple bowl of soup and a sandwich each so we decided to do something "special" for tea. We searched around for a suitable dining place, mostly looking for a little italian or a special chinese buffet, however when we set eyes on THE HARD ROCK CAFE, we knew, without a doubt this was the place to eat out.

The Hard Rock Cafe is situated on George Street in Edinburgh and is extremely difficult to miss; a huge sign outside the door willing people in. As we were on foot, we didn't have to find a parking space, however if you do happen to drive then you may have to hunt around for a parking space. Usually the spaces in the street around are full, so you may have up to a fifteen minute walk to reach the restaurant. The outside of the restaurant was fairly attractive, nothing too special, but the sign post made it quite luring!

We arrived at the "cafe" around 6.20pm. It was fairly busy and there was a small queue at the front of the restaurant. We only had a five minute wait however and the waiter was very apologetic. We were asked by the cheerful looking man, how many of us would like to dine and when we told him four, he took us through to a table nearing the back of the restaurant. To reach our seats we had to walk past the bar. It was quite a friendly environment, and some "jolly" people were sitting round the bar having a laugh with the bar tender.

The restaurant was fairly attractive. If I remember correctly the floor was dark wood and the walls were a wooden too. I would have expected the restaurant to be dark and dinjy however the lights on the roof and all through the eating area were very high power and made the place look bright, but with a great "dark" atmosphere too. Our table was very roomy and probably could have seated two more people. The chairs weren't the comfiest but they were more than bearable, wooden with a red cushion attatched to the "bum area". The table was wood but was covered in a red table cloth, matching the cushions on the seats. On the table were a knife and fork for everybody, a red napkin, salt and pepper pots and some sugar and milk.

Sitting at our table we got a great view of the whole restaurant. It was fairly busy, and there were only about four tables which weren't accompinied by people. It was mainly families dining in the restaurant however there were a couple of couples enjoying a romantic meal too. However, I wouldn't recommend this place for a romantic meal for two due to the noise. There were a couple of toddlers and babies in the dining area which meant there was a real yabble going on. Luckily there were no toddlers running around, perhaps due to the fact the Hard Rock Cafe, or this particular one provides high chairs. The high chairs didn't look to comfortable though, dark wooden without a cushion.

We had only been sitting at our table for around two minutes when the same man who showed us to our table reappeared. He asked if we would like to order drinks and we agreed. My brothers and I quickly opted for a glass of coke, my mum decided to study the drinks menu further.
The drinks were printed on a seperate page of the menu and displayed alot of choice. From soft drinks such as lemonade and coca cola, cocktails, wines, and other alchoholic drinks. My mum opted for a red wine and as soon as we had ordered our drinks waiter darted off to fetch us our refreshments. He returned around 4 minutes later with a tray. The glasses of coke were huge, and my mum was thrilled with the size of the glass of red wine. The waiter told us somebody would be over shortly to take our orders for our starters, so we began studying the menu, deciding what to chose. This caused a lot of problems. There was a huge choice, including; potato skins stuffed with cheeses, bacon and herbs and spices, and nachos which were described as being loaded with cheese and served with a lovely salsa. Aswell as the individual starters, Hard Rock has a special "group starter" which is a combination of all of the delicious starters, perfect for sharing. We decided to buy 3 starters and share them between us.
We opted for cheese garlic bread, potato skins and onion rings. After placing our order, they only took around five minutes to come which was a bonus.
The portions were big, but not huge and we did manage to polish almost everything off. The onion rings were gorgeous, however they were very greasy and it was obvious they had been fried and weren't very healthy. The garlic bread was delicious and surprisngly un-greasy, it did have a very cheesy taste to it but still tasted of a lovely garlic bread. The potato skins were scrumptious too but probably my least favourite out of the three, they were extremely cheesy and very strong. My brother enjoyed most of these! It took us around 15 minutes to polish off our starter and almost immediatly another waiter, this time a red haired girl came over to take our main course orders.

The main course choices are endless, mainly american type dishes. The options are huge, ranging from burgers, pasta dishes and salads. There was a huge choice of burgers, including cheese burgers, triple cheese burgers (etc), big whoppers- topped with bacon, cheese etc, and the regular hamburger among the various. Pasta dishes included macaroni cheese, and chicken pasta, and the salads included caesor salads and chicken salads. There was also a choice of sandwiches and toasties, all served with fries and salad, among these were club sandwiches, and the basic cheese and ham toasties. The choice was so big we didn't know where to start.
In the end I opted for the cheese burger, served with chips and a salad (in dressing). Brother no.1 choose the macaroni cheese which again came served with chips, and brother number two chose the calafornia chicken club sandwich which yet again came served with chips and a dressed salad. My mum pondered for longer over what to choose, but in the end she opted for the fahitas.
After placing our order we had to wait around fifteen minutes on our order. In these fifteen minutes, we ordered a second round of drinks and they arrived around 4 minutes later.
When the main courses arrived, we were absolutly thrilled (again) with the portion sizes, they were huge!

My cheeseburger meal was gorgeous. The burger was juicy and moist, and was topped with 4 slices of scrumptious cheese, and had a choice of tomato sauces, mayonnaises and mustards in a little pot on the side of my plate. The fries were scrumptious too, they were fairly chunky, and didn't feel to greasy. I didn't touch the salad as i'm not too keen on dressings, however it consisted of lettuce, cucumber and rather soggy looking tomato. The dressing was a brown sort of colour, quite horrible looking actually.
Brother number 1 was thrilled with the macaroni cheese meal he had ordered. It was roasting hot when it arrived which was a good thing, and it actually took him five minutes to easily eat it. Apparantly it was really cheesy but not strong cheese which suited him perfectly. The chips were the same as mine, and the mac cheese meal didn't come with salad. Not that he would have eaten it anyway.
Brother number 2 is slightly more picky when it comes to food, so he was slightly anxious about what his meal would entail. The chicken club sandwich was on toasted white bread, mounted high in chicken, bacon and some salad. He picked the salad off but otherwise he was very pleased with his meal, again the chips and salad were the same.
My mum, like us all was absolutly amazed by the high quality of her food. The fahitas came on a large brown tray, a bit like make-your-own-meal. She was provided with four floured tortillas which were warm, and in two different pots was shredded chicken and what I think was shredded beef but I can't be sure. There were various other little pots too, including tomato salsa, sour cream and a green looking substance which she said wasnt very nice.
Our main courses were all delicious and we polished them all of without a word (minus the salad). After around half an hour the waiter came to collect our dishes and then arrived five minutes later with a dessert menu. We hadn't really even been considering dessert as we were all so satisfyed with our main courses but when the menu came our excuse was it was too rude not to order a sweet, so we studied the menu carefully.

The dessert menu was mouthwatering, each dessert sounding utterly scrumptious. The menu included crumbles, pies, sticky toffee puddings and such like. In the end I opted for the apple crumble which came served with ice cream. As brother number 2 wasn't very hungry after his huge main course, he simply ordered a bowl of chocolate ice cream with whipped cream (weird combination eh?) and brother number 1 chose a hot fudge brownie sundae, which consisted of vanilla ice cream, hot fudge sauce, nuts, chocolate sprinkles and fresh whipped cream. Mother decided eventually on a fudge sundae.
When our desserts arrived we were a bit worried whether we'd be able to finish them as the portions were so large. The apple crumbe was steaming hot but the cool vanilla ice cream provided a nice contrast. The apple was sweet and crumble waas even sweeter, sprinked with brown sugar. It was a large portion but I eventually managed to finish it. Brothers both enjoyed there puddings, the ice cream brother number 2 had was still a large portion, even though it was the smallest dessert on the menu. Mother enjoyed her fudge sundae, which consisted of vanilla ice cream, hot fudge sauce and walnuts, and some mixed fruit.
Brother number 1 didn't actually manage to finish all his pudding, but what he did have, he was singing its praises for a long while afterward.

After our meal we were all feeling stuffed so we decided it was time to go for a short walk, so we called on a waiter to bring over the bill. He arrived 5 minutes later with an ashtray looking dish containing a small peice of paper and 4 chocolate truffles. My mum will not tell me how much the meal cost but she does stress it wasn't a cheap meal out.

**

We would all thoroughly recommend eating out at the Hard Rock Cafe. The staff are really friendly, and the service was very quick even though it was fairly busy. The food is of high quality, delicious and almost always piping hot, with great choices and a wide variety of food and drink there is really something for everybody. I can't comment on whether there is a childrens menu as we didn't enquire however I think if there was, next time we go back brother number 2 might go for this as the normal menu was quite big and definitly too big for a younger child.

**

The HRC also sells merchandise in the restaurant in a small "shop". The shop sells things such as clothing, mugs, keyrings etc. We decided not to buy anything as the meal had been so expensive and the memorabilia was quite pricey too! They definitly know how to scam our money out of us.

Sweettooth 93 

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