Following on from our visit to the Steamie, recently, we popped along to try their new venture, Pitta, on Rose Street, to see whether souvlaki will grip Edinburgh in a frenzy of Greek street food.
Exterior
In a well-placed police box, on the stretch of Rose Street between and Hanover Street and St Andrew Square, Pitta has a distinctive purple livery. From the booth, they serve a small array of simple dishes: pork and chicken souvlaki; and a simple salad.
For those uninitiated, which included me until very recently, souvlaki is essentially skewer-cooked meat, traditionally pork or chicken, that can be eaten straight from the skewer, or served in a pitta with salad and tzatziki.
Souvlaki
I’ve actually visited Pitta twice, since they opened. First time, Gary and I popped along and tried the stuffed pitta variety, which were really good.
On my second visit, I had the full “portion”, which comprised two skewers, served with accompanying pitta, salad and tzatziki. Again, this dish tasted satisfyingly good.
"Portion"
They’re finding their way with portion sizes and pricing. You can pick up a skewer for £1.55, but will a meat lollipop satisfy lunchtime hunger? Probably not. Likewise, the souvlaki wrap for between £3.25 and £3.50 will deal with hunger up to a point, but it’s more of a hearty snack.
The portion is certainly more than enough for lunch, but at around £6, is it a little expensive as an everyday lunch item? These are just some of the things that will need to be worked out as the place finds it feet, in the coming weeks and months.
For sure, the food is very tasty, so it’s well worth paying Pitta a visit. It’s certainly good news to have another cuisine available for city centre diners to sample, so more power to their souvlaki elbows, I say.
Scores
Blythe scores Pitta
4/5 for food
3.5/5 for presentation
3.5/5 for service
3/5 for setting
giving an overall 14/20
Today’s questers were: Gary, Blythe
We ate: souvlaki
We drank: nowt
We wore: blue shirt, Belstaff jacket
Total bill: c.£6 (on each visit)
Rose Street
Edinburgh