Our IT department run all sort of analysis of what readers like, what they spend time on and what turns them off. The short story is that readers like short reviews. They don’t want a list of dishes and lots of descriptive waffle, and while they are tangentially interested in décor and ambience etc, basically you just want to know whether, in the opinion of the reviewer, the restaurant is any good and whether it represents value for money.
So here’s the short version. Under the Table was a real surprise, with outstanding food at a price point well below competitive restaurants, and a really smart but non-intimidatory environment. For the avoidance of doubt, I really liked it and have already recommended it to a slew of friends.
First, some background. Its mothership, The Table, which is above Under the Table (naturally) is a restaurant for ten people at a time, where there’s one sitting per evening in which guests sit around an open kitchen and interact with chef-patron Sean Clark, while his partner-in-crime Paul O’Donoghue takes care of the wines. It’s been around since 2015 and has a hard core of loyal followers.
So when the space literally under the table became available, they jumped at it and since April have been steadily building themselves a strong reputation for contemporary Scottish cuisine with a marked Italian influences interspersed with French flourishes. That’s mainly down to head chef Alberto Giaccone, a young Italian from the foot of the Alps in.