Dishoom, Indian restaurant in St Andrew Square, Edinburgh, United Kingdom
Dishoom is an Indian restaurant on St Andrew Square in Edinburgh, with several dining areas fitted with wooden panels, vintage photographs, and brass fixtures. The decor draws on the old cafes of Bombay, giving the space a warm and lived-in feel.
The restaurant takes its inspiration from Patrick Geddes, a Scottish botanist and urban planner who worked in Bombay in 1915 to improve public spaces and civic life. His story drew a line between Edinburgh and Bombay that the restaurant later built on.
The kitchen here combines Scottish ingredients with Indian cooking techniques, serving dishes like a Bacon Naan Roll and traditional Parsi specialties such as Salli Boti. What arrives on your plate speaks to a connection between two cities that are far apart.
The restaurant serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner, so visiting early in the day is a good way to avoid the longest waits. Queues can form at peak times, so booking ahead is a practical step if you have a set time in mind.
The name Dishoom comes from an Urdu word associated with love or affection, pointing to how closely the concept ties itself to the emotional side of Bombay cafe culture. The old Irani cafes that inspired it have largely disappeared from Bombay itself, so this restaurant keeps alive a version of something that barely exists in its original city anymore.
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