Food and drink on the Fringe.

Once a year, I head up to Edinburgh to soak in that fantastic atmosphere in which I was totally immersed during my first year in the UK. During that legendary Summer of 1976, the Fringe which has been going since 1947, was still in its infancy. Being a student, I only managed to see a handful of acts including a few free ones. I have been back on numerous occasions over the years and seen the Edinburgh Festival become the biggest arts festival in the world, attracting over four million visitors every August. Only the Olympics and the Football World Cup sell more tickets.

Though busy all year round, in August, Edinburgh becomes a giant outdoor theatre for budding artists and star-struck audiences. All around the city, multitudes of street performers entertain the crowds while leafleteers try to entice tourists to attend shows in indoor venues or marquees. 

Back in 1976, there were very few eating places apart from pubs and hotels. Beyond the odd fish bar, as fish and chips shops are called in Scotland, I can only remember a Kentucky Fried Chicken, where I first discovered American fast food. There was a handful of French and Italian restaurants and a Chinese near Usher Hall. The jazz club I frequented on Tuesday evenings up the Royal Mile served nothing but basket meals. 

Nowadays, in just about all the streets of the Scottish capital, every other shop is a food outlet. Every little bit of empty space is taken up by a different type of cuisine, from the ubiquitous pie shop to the most bizarre offerings from countries I have never heard of despite my Geography GCSE. The most astonishing thing is that, during August, one has to be lucky to find a seat in any of them. An Afghan restaurant might sit next to a Japanese Sushi bar or an Argentinian steakhouse, a Peruvian fish diner by the side of a Spanish tapas bar and each and every one of them will be full to the brim with hungry visitors. Prices vary greatly depending on the class of food, but it seems that despite the high rents, everyone makes enough money to cover the lean winter months, not that they are ever lean, seen that Edinburgh has something going on every week of the year. 

A few small outlets accept nothing but cash, often claiming on a handwritten notice that the credit card machine is out of order. 

According to information collected from long-established restaurants, business tends to slow down during the festival due to these fly-by-nights which rarely last beyond the end of the festival. Another threat is the proliferation of pop-up café and sandwich bar franchises which have become an integral part of festival venues and tend to charge exorbitant prices. 

This reminds me of 2010 when Hartlepool welcomed the Tall Ships. As well-established restaurants, we decided not to raise our prices for the event in order to showcase value for money in Hartlepool. As a result, firstly, we performed better than the various food trucks that came down for the occasion and secondly, many out-of-town visitors came back long after the ships sailed into the sunset.