Maxies Bistro

We had just come from a horribly serviced restaurant and when we came to Maxie’s everything was a lot better. Our server was a young man and despite having a lot to do (practically serving everyone) he was super helpful and nice and always had a smile on his face. Very pleased with the food as well it was all very good and had many selections to choose from. The only negative I think is the set up, it was so crowded up there the restaurants were split up outside and it was weird, but it’s easy to get around that and is very much worth it.

Un tres bel endroit, tant par sa situation que par son décor !
Les plats écossais typiques sont servis à la francaise, petits légumes pomme de terre, carte des vins et beaux desserts ! Si vous etes dans les parages, un peu blasé de la friture des pubs, mais que vous voulez manger à thème scottish, c’est un super compromis!

Dinner, and it was fantastic food. We had starters and mains, and we were not disappointed. The mussels were some of the best ones I have ever eaten. The salmon came next, and it was cooked to perfection. My company ate salad, fajitas and chicken, and we were all very pleased and happy. The interior is picturesque and warmingly welcome. The staff would be difficult to get a hold of, as they frequently rushed by or looked in the other direction, and the toilets were small and not so nice. But the food will make me go back there again and again.

I was on holiday with my boyfriend. We were at Edinburgh for a couple of days doing tours. We stumbled upon this place, what a happy surprise! First time we came, the place was packed. The server told us it would be about 10 or 15 minutes, she was closing a ticket and they should be leaving soon. No problem. She recommended that we go two doors down at Castle Arms for a drink and we thought why not. We returned and the table was ready for us.
Now the food. My boyfriend had the haggis for appetizer and supper. I had oyster for starter and fish for supper. I tried the haggis for the first time. It was creamy and good. Delish! We ordered a bottle of wine and shared a pudding for desert. The owner came by our table to serve us the food. Server says he’s a hard worker. I can tell he takes pride in his restaurant.
We were happy with the first visit, we came returned the next day!
The only con i could think of is the toilet. There is only 1 ladies room, and on the second night, someone took their time. If I’m ever in Edinburg again, I will definitely come back for another haggis.

Came here with my family during my wedding weekend. The staff was extremely friendly and accommodating seeing as every other restaurant nearby was extremely busy and had no room for our large party. I ordered a chicken entrée which was extremely tasty. The rest of my family all ordered various items off the menu and everyone agreed that our food was good. Good food and great service is all I need when I visit a restaurant and this place delivered.

This was a sad experience. The entry is nicely painted staircase with lively graffitti. The inside looks cozy with exposed brick walls and wine bottles with dripping candles to add to the ambiance. We asked to eat on the terrace. That was probably our mistake. The waitress didn’t came back after we said we needed a minute. The guy waiting on us seemed to be the chef. The food took a while to come out and then was bland and cold. It was pretty though. Just wish it tasted as good as it looked.

Stopped in here with a group of fellow traveler’s for the prix fixe lunch before heading up the road to the castle. The choices were actually pretty good, I ended up with a garlic cheesebread appetizer, salmon stuffed chicken and vegetables for the entrée and a piece of fudge cake for the dessert.
The garlic cheesebread was not what I expected. It was served on a sliced piece of ciabatta bread with very little melted cheddar cheese. It was more like eating toasted bread. I couldn’t find a hint of garlic in it, and I was expecting mozzarella cheese and this Italian sounding appetizer. It wasn’t bad, but not what I expected. I was thinking more along the lines of an Italian dunker than half a grilled cheese sandwich.
The entrée was very well done. Both the chicken and salmon were superb. The sauce on the entrée was also quite nice. The vegetables were a bit over done and were very limp and flavorless.
The dessert was also very good, and the waitress made this fun for us by playing a goofy birthday song I’d never heard before and bringing out a piece with a candle in it for one of our group members who had a birthday.
I’m only giving this 3 stars though for the price. I don’t think it was a very good value. At 22 pounds without beverage (almost USD$ 40) I feel like the portions were a bit small and the culinary value didn’t quite command that sort of price. It was included in my trip package so I wasn’t out anything out of pocket really, but I couldn’t recommend it to someone else unless it were a bit cheaper.
Nice little place though. Service was very good and the food came out quickly. Maybe other dishes would be better and priced more appropriately.

Over all the visits I had here (about once a year since 2010) I think that 2 star is about as much as it deserves. That is NOT for the food, nor for the ambiance — both are seriously lacking in class, depth and flavour. The first few visits we tried some food (notice that I didn’t use the phrase «we had a meal»)
Nope, my 2 stars go to
A. Location.
They are a in brilliant out of the way suntrap in the summer. Sit outside and enjoy the scenery. Definitely worth a star
B. Service. (not the cooking!)
Their front of house are really nice and the amount of unhappy customers must really wear them down. I actually feel sorry for them.
This, my friends, is what you show visitors so they know what to avoid for the rest of their stay. It is a tourist trap. I certainly hope to see a ‘New Kitchen Manager’ banner here rather sooner than later. That may entice me to visit again. Maybe.
Though I am a possibly a sucker to go here once a year in the summer to see any kind of change has been made. only to be disappointed.
Maybe next time

Worst steak of my life!!! Tasted like it was made 2 weeks ago then microwaved a week ago then boiled in bath water today. Cold as hell. Garlic Sauce tasted like watered shit. Never again. The garlic bread was microwaved too! The nice waitress earned their one star for refunding my money

I used to love this place a few years back so when Ms Susie suggested it for a quick bite to eat last night, I was excited to go back.
It was really quiet compared to its neighbours but we didn’t let that put us off. Maybe it should’ve been a warning.
Susie had the chicken enchilada & I opted for the tower of haggis, neeps & tatties, a real winter warmer.
The plates arrived & the portions were generous. Well the haggis & tatties were, the neeps were almost non-​existent. The tatties looked as though they had been toasted under the grill but in fact the dish must’ve been keep warm in the oven as both the tatties & haggis were dried out. I tried to eat some from the middle but it just wasn’t doing it for me.
I cannot fault the service. As soon as I told the waitress she offered me something else from the menu. By then I’d lost my appetite so they took it off the bill.
Shortly after the chap at the next table also complained. He though his breaded mushrooms were going to break his teeth!
Susie’s enchilada was definitely the better choice.
Overall I would’ve given 2 stars but for the decent service which gets it three stars. I may go back but when there’s a wealth of competition it’s better be good next time.

Décor atypique et haut en couleur.
Des viandes très bien cuites et très tendres mais des portions un peu juste.

Let me first say, we were wearied, hungry and circled the town several times before stopping here. It was late and most Edinburgh restaurants stop serving dinner at 10 PM. We snuck in because it was close to our fantastic hotel — Missoni. So the food was no great shakes but not as horrible as other reviewers write. I had poached salmon with boiled veggies and man had spicy chicken something. Both good and not overpowering for a late night meal. We had a bottle of the Maxie’s house red. Good for the price. The interior was small ans quaint; a little stone-​walled, candle-​lit room with a medieval charm. Nice terrace, too. What really stood out was the service. Sweet little cherubs served us with smiles and willingly provided tips for fun stuff to do during our stay. We hung quite awhile and relaxed, chatting with the staff and other guests. I would recommend for late-​night meals after a long day of travel or sunny terrace pint stops. We’re told it rains more than not in Edinburgh so give it a shot on a sunny day. Staff easily gets 5 stars, ambiance 4 stars, food 3. Last note — one of the sweet cherubs tried to tell us we gave too much money, to which we replied, nope we thoroughly enjoyed it. Cheers!

I came for the sun, I stayed for some food and both were really rather nice.
Had it not been a super, super sunny and hot day, and had I not been looking for an outdoor place to eat, drink and soak up the rays (I shall defeat rickets yet!) I may not have come to Maxie’s. But with it’s prime location on Johnstone Terrace, overlooking Victoria Street and the Grassmarket, it got ALL the sunshine and did some quite nice pub grub to boot.
This is old fashioned British pub grub. Not nouveau gasto-​pub posh burgers with portobello mushrooms and haloumi. It’s the sort of pub grub I ate as wee girl at our local smiddy pub. Which is good in it’s own right.
So, of course, I had breaded mushrooms and duck liver pâté. And they were fine. Nice even. The chicken enchillada on the left of me looked really quite good, lots of chicken, fresh ingredients and not too cheesy. But pub grub food is as pub grub food does. No bells and whistles, but still good quality for what it is.
The next time the suns out I’d happily bob down here for another drink and bite to eat. Scottish tan (roughly lobster red) comes as standard.

We stopped in for a snack and to warm up on a rainy November day in early afternoon and had a very pleasant experience sitting in the small lounge bar area. Only a few other people were there, the hot, mulled wine hit the spot and the other snacks were tasty.

Good location, nice décor, nice staff, terrible food. I ate here recently and was decidedly disappointed; from the menu it looked as though the food would be lovely. I had smoked salmon and cream cheese pâté which was much more cheese than pâté, then a very interesting take on enchiladas which unfortunately was the kind of standard I’d expect in McDonalds. My boyfriend had duck and orange pâté which was horrible; he only ate half of it. He then had steak, which he said was nice but the crevettes it came with were mushy and very over-​cooked, and the mashed potato with was dry and crumbly — he said it reminded him of the sort of potato you’d get at school. He thought it’d had all been left under a heat lamp as it was so dry. We were discussing how it had been so busy and the only conclusion that we came to was that it’s in a tourist trap. I don’t think this place gets a lot of repeat business.
My advice if you’re looking for somewhere nice for dinner in this area is to go to Maison Bleue on Victoria St, or The Outsider on George IV Bridge.

i hate to give them a bad review because our waiter was so nice… but, my allegiance to the Unilocal community must persevere!
This was a crappy restaurant. But, it was walking distance from our apartment and my mother-​in-​law wanted something close. Arghhhh.
The drinks were warm (yes, I know I’m in Scotland… but, I’m from the US where we serve cold drinks) and the food was mediocre. Had the shrimp stir fry and it was pretty bland. The only good thing was the price and the nice waiter.
Don’t waste your money. I lost my pounds so you don’t have to.

I went to Maxies Bistro — with so many options, I went there because of their cleverly placed sign at the bottom of the steps on Victoria St which lured me upwards. It was open late one night in Edinburgh. It was too cold to eat in the Terrace but at the time the Terrace looked too lonely to be eating out from. I sat at a cushy table near the bar — that part of the restaurant makes me think of Persia in its glory, but the food is quite decidedly Scottish. I had the Tower of Haggis — an arrangement of Haggis, Neeps and Tatties fancifully arranged as a tower. It was quiet at the time — just me and the bartender so I sat back and relaxed and paired it with some mulled wine and finished with a great Berry Crumble dessert. Good value. Hurray for free wi-​fi access as well!

Maxies doesn’t look much from the outside, and to be honest, it isn’t up to all that much inside either. Situated just round the corner from the Royal Mile, Maxies is right behind Edinburgh Castle and so it ought to be a great restaurant for all the tourists to go, but unfortunately it is not up to much.
The restaurant has quite a cosy feel inside with padded seats covered in cushions, with a pretty lively atmosphere. The menu in Maxies is pretty much seafood orientated, with lots of fish and seafood dishes, but there are also steaks, stir fry’s, chicken and haggis dishes on the menu too. I had the sole cooked in a creamy sauce, which was OK. The sauce was pretty thick and gloopy and lacked proper taste, but the fish was perfectly cooked. My friend had a pasta dish which they really didn’t like, she said the pasta was still hard and that the sauce was tepid — not nice. The service was pretty average too, the waiter’s weren’t that attentive and only seemed to show some life when we asked for the bill.
There are much better restaurants in Edinburgh which are more deserving of the custom than Maxies.

The best thing about this place is probably how it looks… which is never a great thing to write about a restaurant/​pub/​bistro — I’m not really sure which one this place is supposed to be.
It was too pricey to be classed as a gastro-​pub sort of place, but the food wasn’t really restaurant standard, nor was the service. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t terrible, but the what you pay and what you get don’t quite tally up somehow, especially when you’ve got such amazing places earby like the Grain Store or Maison Bleue.
It’s just above Victoria Street, in the side of the hill stretching up to the castle, so if you get a table on it’s little outdoor terrace in the sun then you may as well just write off any constructive plans you may have had for the rest of the day, because I can safely say you’ll be sipping something cold for the rest of the afternoon.

Excellent location with good food and excellent service.
We got into this place after walking around Edinburgh, site-​seeing and shopping.
I passed by this little place the day before and I decided to come back and try it out.
It’s a cozy little place, warm and comfortable. We were greeted from the door and seated immediately.
We started with couple of appetizers such as the infused game pâté and grilled brie, and for main dish I ordered the steak with black pudding and my friend ordered the sauteed chicken in red pepper sauce. Both of the dishes were well prepared. The steak and the black pudding just hit the spot. I also tried my friend’s chicken and I loved that red pepper sauce.
Veggies were a bit plain and maybe a little over cooked but the dinner was enjoyable and was fully completed with the great service we got from the woman working at the restaurant. I am not sure if she was the manager or not. But she was quite polite and helpful.
I would love to come here in summer and dine out on the patio, it has such a nice and unique view…

Horrendous. Truly wolf dressed as lamb. The décor and layout were deceptively nice, but please do not waste your bills on this place. Our waiter was surly and only attempted a pleasantry when bringing the bill. The food was standard if not completely appalling (some had a brown salad, others had meh 15 pound lamb, and I had bland mushroom pasta that left me in the bathroom for a good part of the night). Plenty of other places in this fair city.