Handy for Haymarket Station, and all of five minutes’ walk from the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, Milk appeared in 2010. It’s a very small café with simple, raised-bench seating and tables, and white-tiled walls. Since launch however, the business has picked up catering franchises at locations across the city, including the Collective Gallery, Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop, the Fruitmarket Gallery and Jupiter Artland during its annual May to September opening season.
Clearly, Milk is doing something right and that something is the food. The breakfasts at these original Morrison Street premises are pretty good, but come lunchtime there's a selection of excellent sandwiches, salads, hot dishes and specials. A typical sandwich would be chorizo, avocado, Comté cheese and slow-roasted tomato on germagrain; or how about a chicken ceasar salad with kale, spinach, roasted chickpeas and Grana Padano? Then there are more substantial dishes such as roast chicken burrito, vegetarian Chiang Mai noodles – or a rosemary, roast vegetable and feta tart off the ever-changing specials board.
Milk isn’t a venue to dawdle in – and a significant number of people use it as a takeaway – but if you’re in the neighbourhood and looking for lunch, then its quality has established it as a destination of choice.