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This article is part of FT Globetrotter’s guide to Edinburgh
“We’ve been expecting you!” Glen Montgomery says warmly, as he whips open the door, squirrels away our coats and proffers glasses of champagne, as though we’ve just arrived at his place for a dinner party.
We sort of have: this is Eòrna, a 12-cover chef’s table restaurant in Edinburgh’s chichi Stockbridge neighbourhood, which Montgomery, a sommelier, hosts alongside chef Brian Grigor. There are no other chefs, no front-of-house staff; Grigor does the food, Montgomery the drinks and service. It’s a well-oiled machine serving a seasonal Scottish tasting menu with a slew of old-world wines.
Escaping the silvery April deluge outside, we take our seats at a marble countertop that surrounds a sleek, stainless-steel kitchen, and meet Grigor, who is piping black-pudding mousse into choux pastry. His workspace is remarkably tidy — the arduous, messy prep clearly completed before guests arrive.
Service begins with a trio of canapés: little pastry spheres that explode with meaty flavour; taramasalata in a gossamer-thin cone that is in defiance of the laws of physics; and dollops of liver parfait and curry emulsion on a cracker, which, if your eyes are closed, might conjure chicken tikka.
As an Edinburgh native and the son of a gamekeeper, Grigor has long been passionate about showcasing Scottish ingredients and his seven-course menu sings of the Saltire. “These are the best scallops in the world,” he says, handing over a plump specimen, hand-dived off the Orkneys and plated up atop a viridescent leek and potato purée with smoked haddock — a deconstructed Cullen skink of sorts.
Another course, the smoked salmon, cut almost as thick as a fillet, is a revelation for a heathen like myself who could (and I whisper) probably live without the smokey stuff. But Grigor has worked with a local smokehouse for years, developing a recipe to cure and smoke the fish just so. “I wanted to show how great smoked salmon can be — it’s not just the generic stuff we see on the supermarket shelves,” he says. “A lot of people comment that they don’t like smoked salmon but love this dish.”
While Grigor quietly, confidently sears, grills, squeezes, tweezers and plates, the gregarious Montgomery takes the reins as host. He brings over a glass of 2013 Gewürztraminer from Domaine Kirrenbourg, based just outside of Colmar, France, to a join an asparagus dish — a pairing inspired by white asparagus season in the Alsace region. “It smells sherry-like and is perfume-y, but not too much, unlike a lot of other Gewürztraminers, which can smell like your grandmother’s knickers drawers,” he says with a smile.
Later, to accompany a hogget dish — my favourite course of the night — he serves a 2020 Barbera and, after learning of our fondness for fickle Piedmontese wines, enthusiastically offers tasters of the same vintage at different stages of oxygenation so we can see how it evolves over opening time.
The wine here is given equal weight to the food — the chef’s table set-up works not to fetishise the person in whites but to witness a fruitful partnership between two highly skilled professionals.
Grigor worked at the Greywalls Hotel, The Kitchin and with Nick Nairn, before joining Edinburgh’s The Balmoral hotel as head chef and later taking an executive role for the Roux family. Montgomery, who is originally from Northern Ireland, worked at a number of top hospitality businesses across Scotland before becoming head sommelier at The Balmoral, where the duo met.
Montgomery later moved to the two-Michelin-star Restaurant Andrew Fairlie at Gleneagles, before returning to Edinburgh to help open Heron in Leith. Around the same time, Grigor began toying with the idea of opening his own restaurant. “I knew that I needed someone that could drive the beverage side and service, and I wanted to have a business partner as well,” he says. “Glen was the first and only person I thought of.”
Running an operation like theirs is not for the faint of heart. Eòrna offers a dinner service five days a week (it is closed on Sundays and Mondays) and the hours are lengthy and gruelling. Food prep can begin between 8am and 10am, before doors open at 7pm. Service doesn’t usually wrap up till 11pm, often later if diners linger over a digestif and take in the duo’s extremely random but delightful playlist, which features everything from classic rock to old-school hip hop and the Backstreet Boys (temptation for the millennials at the table to break out into song).
It’s a long evening for guests, too, but the menu (£95) is well pitched at seven courses including canapés, with no surprises. As tasting menus have become increasingly spun out and restraint too rare, it is refreshing to see a piece of paper listing exactly what you will be served. The result is an experience in which guests are able to truly enjoy each dish — and enjoyment is the whole point. Grigor says: “I just want people to come and spend an evening with me and Glen, eating some good food, drinking some nice wine, listening to some cool music and getting lost in the whole experience.”
Opening times: Tuesday-Saturday, 7pm–11pm. 68 Hamilton Place, Edinburgh EH3 5AZ; eornarestaurant.com
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