Frizzante Proseccheria — Restaurant in City of Edinburgh

Absolutely HORRIBLE experience. My friend and I came in and wanted to order a few appetizers to try a little bit of everything on the menu. Our waitress said we were not allowed to do that and told us that we had to order a main course. My friend had already ordered a drink so we felt like we couldn’t leave. When my friend ordered the drink, the waitress asked “small or large?” And when my friend answered “small”, The waitress said “OK large” and brought her a large and CHARGED for a large. She continued to come to our table every 30 seconds to see if we chose what we wanted to order, and kept getting annoyed when we didn’t have an answer in literally 30 seconds. I try to stay away from gluten and was not interested in pizza or pasta so I asked again if it was possible to order multiple appetizers as a main course, To what she rudely pointed to the menu, it says that’s not possible and said I need to order a main course right now. I have never in my life, been forced to order at a restaurant. It seemed like she wanted us to just hurry up and get out. When she brought over the food, I got a teeny tiny $20 bowl of pasta, She offered my friend and I black pepper, When she offered it to my friend, my friend said yes, please, and she proceeded to turn around and walk away without giving her black pepper. The wait staff came up to us probably once every two minutes because they wanted us to hurry up and it was very uncomfortable. My friend got muscles, some were undercooked and had barnacles on them, which is unheard of. The sauce was canned tomato soup for the muscles, I’ve never seen muscles be served like this and definitely not authentically in an Italian restaurant. My friend asked for some bread to dip into the sauce, which usually comes with an entrée of muscles, but she was charged $8 USD for it. Overall, the food was OK, But not worth the rude staff, and the extremely uncomfortable experience. I do...

My team and I were in Edinburgh for a conference. We arrived at the restaurant 90mins before close. After seating us the staff made us feel incredibly unwelcome. They kept trying to rush us to order. Lots of side eye and hurmphing when we asked for more time to look at the menu. And then they told us the kitchen was about to close. If they didn't want our business they shouldn't have sat us down in the first place. They could have just said they were closing early and were sorry but couldn't help us. Accepting our party and then making us feel like we had done them a disservice was wrong. After we ordered they came over and said that we HAD to pay in cash because their machine was broken. Most of us did NOT have cash. We were advised against using cash because we might not be able to exchange Scottish bills when we left to return home. The lone person with cash was unsure if he had enough to cover the bill. The waitress then kept insisting that we just go around the corner to an ATM. She then came back and said that the machine was fixed and so we could actually pay with credit card. At the end of the meal the man who cleared the table was aggressive and rude and then when he had us pay he kept telling my boss that the service charge was not included...it was not included...it had to be done in cash. While the food was good, it wasn't special and it certainly wasn't good enough to return to this place after such...

To be honest, I picked this restaurant knowing it would probably be a mediocre tourist trap but I needed something close to my hotel that would be easy for a group. I had hoped to be pleasantly surprised, but sadly was not. One redeeming factor was comfortable booth seating but the food and service were exactly what one would expect in a restaurant that survives on location rather than actual food. If I hadn’t gone in with very low expectations, I would have been more annoyed.

The pasta arrabiata was drowning under a sauce that seemed flavored with Tabasco and the salad was bland. The waiter seemed annoyed that we wanted to share plates and pointed out that each person was required to order an entree (even kids), but how any one person can be expected to eat these completely underwhelming entrees in their entirety all on their own is beyond me. We only made it through by mixing things up a bit as the pizzas were not bad and some members of our party were congested or amused enough to not mind the Tabasco flavored arrabiata too much in small quantity.

And while they make a very big deal about how children cannot have the tiramisu because of the alcohol, I suggest adults should also feel free to give it a miss. You will not...