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posted on Wednesday 29 January 2014 @ 05:15 by Unknown

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Saturday Night
Now, I'm not normally one for going out at the weekends; I can't stand the crowds, the prices, the atmosphere or the "Woop Woop it's da weekend" types who end up crying in the toilets whilst their friends re-do their make-up for the 87th time and pretend to listen. However, last Saturday I made an exception, as my favourite cousin was up from Lincoln for the weekend, and I promised to take him out to celebrate him having turned 21 a couple of weeks ago.

The plan was to go for dinner, with my brother and his girlfriend, then head for drinks and then a dance. Because neither my brother or I are particularly organised, this remained the full extent of the plan until Saturday morning, when I finally decided to get something booked for dinner. Having left it so late to book a table, I knew my options would be limited. I had to choose somewhere within our budget (my bro and his burd are both students), in the city center (for easy travel between restaurant and pub) and that had space for us around 7ish... TopTable to the rescue!

Image Courtesy of MP's Google+
I booked MP's Bistro, part of the Parliament House Hotel on Calton Hill for 18:45, and as TopTable customers, we managed to wangle ourselves 2 courses AND a glass of wine for £17 each! Incredibly, the offer applies to anything on the menu, not just certain options (although some items, like the steak, incur sur-charges, but that's to be expected.) The menu isn't huge, but has something for everyone, and the food was excellent.
To start with, two of us had marinated pork, black pudding and smoked bacon terrine, which came with red onion marmalade and apple chutney; one had a tower of roasted vegetables and lemon rosemary, which was, a little disappointingly, served cold, but was still tasty; and our fourth diner had the biggest bowl of carrot and sage soup the world has ever seen - good, but nothing to write home about. For our main courses, three of us had chicken stuffed with haggis (it was Burns' Night you see) which was served in a Drambuie cream sauce and with the most delicious wholegrain mustard mash (I need to make that at home!), and Beth, the fourth, had a burger - homemade, not the best I've ever tasted, but very good nonetheless, I think the burger bun was home-made too, which was hugely impressive, and hand-cut chips. I had some roast carrots and parsnips too, which were bloody delicious, but it's hard NOT to make parsnips the tastiest things known to man. We were served by 3 different girls, all Italian and all polite, but slightly lacking in charisma. Service-wise there was nothing to complain about, but nothing worth leaving more than the expected 10% tip. The restaurant itself, I'm guessing, is fairly new - it was so quiet and I had never heard of it before finding it online, and is decorated more like a reception/waiting area for a private health clinic than a restaurant, but was clean and unintrusive. If you need the bathroom while you're there, don't wait until you're desperate, because the bathrooms are VERY far away and you will probably get lost. Even if you don't book through TopTable, you get 2 courses for £16 or 3 for £19, which is still an absolute bargain, considering the location and quality of food, so well worth a visit.


Image courtesy of TripAdvisor

After our meal, we headed to The Newsroom, opposite St James Shopping Centre on Leith Street. I had passed it recently and saw it was being re-furbished, so I was eager to check it out. The atmosphere was buzzing, the music was an eclectic collection of remixes provided by the in-house DJ - so nice to have someone in control of the music, rather than just a generic playlist of chart nonsense. The bar has a News theme to it - blown up newspaper articles adorn the walls, the menus look like broad sheets, complete with humorous nonsense articles, and the day's papers hanging from holders placed along the bar. Their house white is a Chardonnay, so obviously I had to have something from further down the list - a Sauvy-B at £5 a glass, not great, so I switched to Pinot for another, much more palettable, fiver. My cousin, Jamie, drinks Jack Daniels, and was delighted to see they had Gentleman Jack on their shelves, so treated himself to a double, no idea how much that cost, but the fact they sell it is merit enough. A bunch of my pals were out, including our own lovely Ceci, so they joined us and much merriment ensued.


Image courtesey of The Electric Circus
I had decided earlier on that the dancing would take place in Electric Circus at their "Magic Nostalgic" night, which I had been to a couple of times before and had always enjoyed myself. The Electric Circus is a really cool venue, tucked round the back of Waverley Train Station on Market Street. Through the back they have 5 or 6 little rooms which you can hire out as a private area for you and your pals, each of which has a kareoke machine! The main dancefloor isn't huge, so can be a bit cramped at times, but that's pretty standard anywhere on a Saturday night! The bar is right in front of you as you come in, and runs off the side of the dancefloor as well. The bar staff are awesome. All of them are dressed smartly, but with a bit of flair, and seem to really enjoy what they do - I watched them dancing and singing with each other on numerous occasions, and they are always up for a bit of banter, despite being rushed off their feet. There are a few wee booths by the bar too - arrive early-ish if you want a seated base for the night (we arrived at around midnight and were very lucky to get one). As the name suggests, Magic Nostalgic is a "retro" night (I use that term loosely, as I'm not sure 5ive counts as retro...) but with a fun twist - every half an hour, the unbelieveably energetic DJ hauls someone off the dancefloor, usually a Hen or a Birthday Boy/Girl, and asks them to spin a wheel of fortune to determine which genre will be played next. Highlights from Saturday night included 30 minutes of "Rock Gods" and half an hour in which I think we heard every Aussie song that doesn't make you want to claw your eyes out (they were celebrating Australia Day). This was the third time I had ever been to this particular event, I've always had an awesome time - I would highly reccommend it to anyone looking for something a bit different to the usual George Street Grind.

Here is a picture of us enjoying ourselves. They are giving me the finger as I refused to have my picture taken that night - I had to enforce a law of Radio Silence that weekend, as I was technically skiving work.

Lewis, Kayliegh, Mat, Russell (my wee bro), Jamie (my cousin) and Ceci.
Image courtesy of The Electric Circus

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