As the Edinburgh Fringe begins to loom on the horizon, the capital’s restaurant scene usually goes into a frenzy of fresh openings.

Contemporary Scottish and European

We have our ear to the ground and will report on any newbies – Chop House II and Ninja Kitchen, we’re looking at you – as their opening dates firm up.

In the meantime, we bring glad tidings of Lovage, a new place on St Mary’s Street which opened just over a month ago.

Run by Lukasz and Bartek Jedrejek, the venture is in the former Stac Polly premises.

The brothers have interesting CVs which mention places like Tom Kitchin’s Scran and Scallie, Tamka 43 in Warsaw and even a five year stint in biomedical science.

The duo promise a contemporary mix of seasonal, Scottish produce and both European and local cooking traditions.

Foraging

Dish components such as lovage foam, pine sorbet and wild garlic strongly suggest that the chefs split their time between the kitchen and foraging in the countryside.

On the menu, each dish is written as a list of ingredients. For example, a starter on the dinner menu is described as pork belly, chorizo, porter, apple, horseradish, baby leek and buckwheat.

It is clear and simple but a few hints about the way in which the dish is prepared wouldn’t go amiss.

On the plus side, the pictures on their Facebook page fair leap from the screen and we’re looking forward to giving the menu a run through.

Progressive cooking

The lunch menu is two courses for £13.95 and three for £17.95. At dinner, the a la carte menu comes into play and three courses will come in at roughly £30.

With Aizle just up the road at St Leonard’s and Wedgwood around the corner on the Royal Mile, that little patch of central Edinburgh is fast becoming a hotbed of progressive cooking.