Bellini

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• What are these?

• Average price 2 courses: £28
• House wine: £15.90 per bottle

• Hitlisted
• High point: Pitch perfect service and cooking
• Low point: Occasional fussy old-school garnish
• Food served: Tue-Sun 6-10.30pm. Closed Mon
• Open since: 1999
• Also offers: Childrens portions

The List's Eating & Drinking Guide 2008 is now in the shops.

This review is from the 2007 edition.

The sea bass is beautiful. The belly is as pearly white as the moment the fish was pulled from the sea. The pewter-coloured skin is lightly charred and fennel seeds and the merest whiff of earthy truffle oil fragrance the perfectly cooked flesh. It's a fitting piatto forto after home-made wild mushroom ravioli creamily sauced with butter and lemon. A skilled Italian working Scotland's larder is a match made in heaven: beside the day's fresh fish, chef Angelo Cimini makes impeccable use of Scotch beef, perhaps slicing fillet for carpaccio and counterpoising its texture, taste and colour with spicy dark green rocket and fruity olive oil. Gina, his wife, brings a light touch and an eagle eye to front of house, and makes you feel sufficiently cosseted that the 35-minute wait for cooked-to-order risotto seems the perfect excuse to unwind with a classic Italian or French bottle. The quality of raw ingredients, and respect with which they are treated, make this no place for quick or cheap eating, but prices are not greedy for such refinement. Bellini's sumptuous blue and gilded décor and crystal chandeliers are indubitably grand, but the owners' mission statement is a friendly one: be welcome and enjoy.