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Our restaurant consists of a spacious main dining area and bar, with two smaller rooms available for private functions, accommodating over one hundred diners at full capacity. We serve Italian food ranging from simple to sophisticated, but always remain true to the idea that quality ingredients are the key to our success. All the bread used at VinCaffè is made in our own bakery using organic flour, and we use our own brand Fior' Fiore olive oil throughout our cooking. The bar stocks an extensive list of wine from Valvona & Crolla's own award-winning wine range and, using our Cruvinet wine system, almost all of the range is available by the glass.
Sample menu from the VinCaffè Restaurant
Below are some typical dishes served at VinCaffè. The full menu has further choices in each range. To see full restaurant menu click here
Assaggini
- Funghi alla Griglia - £3.75
Portobello mushroom grilled with garlic and parsley breadcrumbs.
- Salsiccia con Vino - £3.95
Italian Paesano sausage cooked with red wine and tomato.
- Cichetti - £3.95
Selection of 5 Italian tasters on skewers, a Venetian institution!.
- Any 2 of the above and a glass of house red or white wine - £9.99
Antipasto
- Frittura di Legumi con Maionese Verdure- £6.75
Freshly prepared florets of broccoli and sliced peppers dipped in flour and lightly deep fried, served with caper and parsley mayonnaise.
- Polpettine al Sugo - £7.75
Family recipe handmade pork and beef mince meatballs with pine nuts, served with a rich tomato sugo and V&C® sourdough bread
- Involtini di Zucchini - £6.95
Grilled courgettes rolled with mozzarella and basil, oven roasted with tonmato sugo and Parmigiano Reggiano.
- Tagliere di Manzo - £9.95
Wafer thin slices of Aberdeen Angus fillet of Beef, served with V&C Fior’Fiore® extra virgin olive oil, garlic and chilli, flash roasted in a hot oven
- V&C Antipasto - £11.95 (£18.95 for two)
Selection of Italian cured meats, Fonteluna sausage, mozzarella di bufala, marinated cherry tomatoes, roast vegetables and bruschetta
Pasta
- Tagliatelle con Salsiccia e Funghi - £11.95
Handmade egg pasta with Italian fresh pork Lucanica sausage, tomato, mushrooms and a little cream.
- Linguini con Granchino - £12.95
Pasta served with Crab meat tossed with extra virgin olive oil,garlic, chilli and fresh parsley-This dish may contain traces of crab shell.
Pizza
- Pizza con Zucca, Mozzarella e Basilico - £9.95
Pizza with roast pumkin, mozzarella di bufala, basil and fresh thyme.
- Pizza con Calamari, Pepperoni e Olive - £10.50
Pizza with roast red pepper, fresh squid, black olives and tomato sugo.
Piatto Principale
Daily fresh fish specials are available Tuesday - Saturday
- Melanzane in Carozza - £12.95
Mozzarella di bufala layered between slices of aubergine dipped in egg and breadcrumbs then panfried in Italian butter, served with a finely sliced fennel and carrot salad.
- Fegato alla Veneziana - £13.95
Pan-fried Scottish calf'sliver with garlic, chilli, red onion and balsamic vinegar, served with olive oli mashed potato.
- Braciola di Maiale - £15.95
Scottish Pork chop stuffed with fontina cheese and basil, coated in breadcrumbs and panfried, served with diced roast potatoes and sauteed spinach.
- Quaglie in Tegame - £17.50
Roast boneless quails stuffed with lemon and rosemary, wrapped in pancetta served with polenta and roast butternut squash.
- Filetto di Cervo - £17.95
Fillet of Highlamd Venison served medium rare with roast winter vegetables seasoned with balsamic condimento.
Dolci
- Gelato Mista - £4.95
Real Italian Ice Cream imported exclusively from Milan, please ask for today’s flavors (gluten free)
- Panna Cotta con Limoncello - £4.25
Creamy dessert made with lemon, served with a dash of Limoncello (gluten free)
- Buddino di Broiche - £5.45
Bread and butter pudding, made with brioche, served warm with cream
- Torta di Cioccolato - £5.95
Chocolate truffle cake made with 70% Valrhona chocolate, served with crème fraiche (gluten free)
Menu items and prices shown above may vary and are for information only
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Restaurant reviews
The List
Eating & Drinking Guide 2008-09
(Special mention in the Italian Hitlist section)
"Centrally located in the swanky shopping precinct of Multrees Walk, Valvona & Crolla VinCaffè exudes a simple sophistication that keeps it at the top of Edinburgh's A-list of Italian eateries. It's sleek chrome and wood-panelled interior, live jazz and black-and-white films projected on to one wall provides a stylish setting, and discreet service permits you to take your time ordering, and enjoying, your selections.
A succinct, weekly-changing menu showcases the stellar seasonal Italian procuce that devotees of the V&C brand expect, and the marriage of strong flavours that don't overpower shines through in every well thought out dish. Antipasti include marinated beef fillet slices topped with juicy caperberries and the delicately deep-fried calamari special with chunky home-made pasta with Italian cured bacon and wild mushrooms to ricotta, spinach and nutmeg pancakes dressed with a deliciously light tomato sugo.
The dolci menu doesn't disappoint-cinnamon pears poached in red wine or a classic lemon tart cap off a pricey but brilliant meal-and a fabulous wine list featuring some 50 wines by the glass allows you to mix and match without worrying about blowing the budget.
Downstairs in the cafè, a delightful selection of sweet and savoury treats, coffees and wines awaits."
www.RampantScotland.com
Best Places to Eat in Scotland
"Simple, fresh ingredients - quality tomatoes, cheese, oils, salami - classic Italian food with taste and texture which creates a superb fine eating and drinking experience. Now in the heart of Edinburgh, you can imagine yourself sitting in a Milan café. An excellent flexible menu from superb home-made Spaghettini and glass of wine or take time out from shopping with a good strong coffee and slice of torta di pistachio."
(Read the full review)
The List
Eating & Drinking Guide 2006-07
"Located just a Manolo's throw from Edinburgh's fashion mecca, Harvey Nichols, with its black wooden continental tables and chairs, mosaic pillars and mirrored walls, VinCaffè's contemporary first floor dining space oozes more style than a Milanese catwalk. That said, there's nothing prima donna-esque about the latest venture from Valvona & Crolla, the darlings of the Scottish deli scene, and the mellow vibe appeals both to greying gourmets and well-heeled young trendy-somethings.
Although images of film stars adorn one wall (via a projector screening subtitled 1950s classics) it's the unfussy, authentic antipasti, pizzas, pastas, secondo piattos and puds that steal the limelight. A simple starter of roasted mixed vegetables, crisp bruschetta, juicy chilli and oregano-marinated olives and soft buffalo mozzarella (not to mention a light and silky panacotta made with Madagascan vanilla pods) acts as a particularly good ambassador for the super-fresh, quality Italian fare now synonymous with the family name. In addition, a model wine list utilises award-winning Cruvinet technology to enable 24 wines to be offered by the glass, making sampling that '94 sassicaia you've always fancied an affordable reality. The downstairs deli and bar holds further treats for those whose budget is lamentably limited by time."
Scotsman
12 May 2006
Owned by the Italian family behind Valvona and Crolla, Vincaffè is the latest addition - a sleek cafe in Multrees Walk. "This is the nearest thing you'll get to an Italian cafe," says Richard, as he settles down with an espresso. "The smell of the fresh coffee, the surroundings and the ambience are perfect."
"Perfect [espresso]. It is the right flavour and made with superior coffee beans. It's a classical Italian espresso made very well. The temperature is also right - all too often coffee houses make the mistake of making the espresso too hot. At £1.50 this is very good value for money."
(Read the full story)
Richard Demarco compares Edinburgh coffee shops
Metro
27 April 2005
"For dessert, we split a zuccotto (£5.50), which I think is Italian for heart attack. Like a tiramisu on steroids, this packed two sorts of sponge, various creams, rum and strega liqueur into one slab of death-defying gorgeousness. From the Antipasto to the deep, dark coffee, this was a lip-smacking meal [and] with a £21 bottle of Barbaresco weighed in at a surprisingly reasonable £73.40. If only everything round these parts was as good value."
Jonathan Trew
The Evening Herald
19 February 2005
"After a few minutes soaking up the atmosphere, our treats arrived. The dish of melon and parma ham was capacious, fresh with chilled melon covered in oodles of wafer-thin, soft parma ham - delicious. The succulent meatballs, packed with pork and beef mince were cooked to perfection and served with a rich tomato sugo and crusty bread.
"Our starters would have easily made for lunch or a light dinner themselves, but the main event seemed too good to miss. And we were glad when it arrived. The pizza brimming with parma ham, mozarella di bufala, tomato and peppery rocket spilled over the outsized plate and looked as good as those I so regularly devoured in Florence. It tasted almost as good - the parma ham still soft and flavourful, the pizza dough light and crispy.
"After two hearty courses of culinary bliss, our appetites were more than satisfied. But we soldiered on when the waitress tempted us with the dessert menu. The array of dolce sins is enough to ruin any healthy eating regime, but we settled on the torta di cioccolato, with two spoons. The chocolate truffle cake made with 70 per cent Valrhona chocolate was heaven - moist and light. It was difficult not to order another one."
(Read the full review by Sarah Howden)
The Sunday Times
5 December 2004
"Edinburgh's food lovers are in raptures over the deli dynasty Valvona & Crolla's new project - and rightly so. The prices are not shy but this is high-end stuff, prepared with a puritan respect for tradition, as simply as possible but with expertise oozing from every bite.
"The menu is broad and detailed, following the proper antipasto/secondo piatto template, with salads, pizzas and pastas also thrown in. The tagliere di manzo al forno (wafer-thin slices of Aberdeen Angus marinated in olive oil then flash-roasted) [was] laughably delicious, all the more so for its rarity on Scottish menus. For mains, the standard was matched by the spaghettini with chilli and anchovy, an essay in how something simple can be truly exemplary, and a superb pork-sausage pizza. Everything, in fact, was first class.
"The queue for a table snaked down the stairs, quite unsurprisingly, for this is a bright, vital, profoundly engaging establishment with impressively high ambitions and cooking that exceeds all cafe standards; and even, I'd imagine, the expectations of V&C veterans. The minute they move it to Glasgow I'll be there every afternoon."
Alan Brown
The Scotsman
4 December 2004
"We tried a glass [of Sassicaia '94], and a Tignanello ’99 - both of them corruptingly delicious. And a perfect complement to Tagliere di Manzo al Forno (£9) wafer thin, butter soft slices of Aberdeen Angus fillet which is marinated in olive oil, chilli and garlic, then flash-roasted to release its full savour. Food for a Medici. The verdura alla piastre (also £9) would have made a lunch in itself: roasted courgettes, aubergine and peppers, lightly dressed with olive oil and lemon, buffalo mozzarella, a small herbal hedgerow, sweet cherry tomatoes and chunks of crunchy bruschetta. Simple, but ridiculously good. ...the best lunch I’ve eaten in years."
(Full review by Gillian Glover)
Sunday Herald
21 November 2004
"In Italy, it's perfectly fine to order antipasti and primi, then decide what more you feel like, if anything, once you have eaten those. And this is what I love about Valvona & Crolla's new VinCaffè. It lends itself to proper Italian eating. A dish is what it says it is and no messing. It stands or falls on its basic integrity. And when these focussed dishes are as delicious as ours were, this is all you need to be perfectly satisfied.
"...we split a portion of taglierini with courgette and cream. That may sound boring until I tell you that the home-made pasta was consummately slippery and freshly eggy, the courgette just a minute or so past raw, the whole thing bound by reduced cream and freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano. In fact, it was another lick-the-plate job. And so on to a secondo of truly memorable squid, delicate violet-coloured tentacles and bouncy white rings tender under their ever-so-light, rustling batter.
"I cannot think of a more captivating pudding than torta di pistacchio, a moist buttery cake dense with green pistachios. However, I think it is positively irresponsible to sell it to take away, downstairs in the café, where people like me have to walk by and try to resist its magnetic lure. This place is also heaven on earth for Italophile wine buffs, too. Stunning wines by the bottle, marked up a restrained £5 on shop prices, plus legendary wines such as Sassicaia and Gaja's Barbaresco by the glass."
Joanna Blythman
Customer Comments
Just a little note to thank you for the great meal we had with you last Friday. We all had a lovely time, the venison was fantastic and I would thoroughly recommend Vin Caffe to any one looking for a good night out. - Dec 09
Many thanks for hosting the wine tasting dinner on saturday night for my hen night - it was fantastic and everyone had such a good night - fabulous food and wine. Loved the number 7 wine - the Amarone - beautiful !!. I'll be in to buy a few bottles in the next week or so. - Sept 09
I would just like to thank you so much for looking after our guests at the Wine Tasting and Dinner last night.
Everyone has commented on how good the wine and dinner was and how much they really enjoyed the evening.
Thank you again, I hope to be able to arrange something similar again soon at Vin Caffe. - Oct 08
Thank you for a splendid evening meal on Friday. We all enjoyed our time with you and everything went well - Oct 08
Just wanted to say thank you for last night, we had a fabulous meal and listened to some wonderful music. It was a real treat and thoroughly enjoyed. - Oct 08
just a quick note with a HUGE thanks for the fantastic dinner on Monday night in Edinburgh. It was the perfect venue, and you looked after us beautifully. The food was outstanding and the staff were great. I know I said it to you when we met, but Naomi and I have so enjoyed working with you on this event – it has been such a pleasure, and so different to the complacent or often cynical treatment you get from so many other venues and restaurants. You are a breath of fresh air, and delivered a really elegant and enjoyable end to our day. Thanks so much – please pass on our thanks to the team on duty on Monday night. - Mar 09
Just a quick line to thank you and all of the staff at Vin Caffé for a wonderful evening last night. You and the staff were extremely helpful, efficient and professional which helped the event run really smoothly. The University and the event sponsor were delighted with the evening and we have had fantastic feedback about the food. Thanks for all of your help in the run up to the event. - Mar 09
I just wanted to thank you and your staff for a wonderful dinner on Saturday night. Everyone in the party enjoyed their meal and the service was really excellent. - Apr 09
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