Which 1970s celebrity would you most like to stumble upon in an Edinburgh restaurant? Windsor Davies? David Frost? Elaine Stritch? As we climbed the sweeping staircase of Le Monde, the enormous complex — comprising hotel, nightclub, restaurant and bar — created in what was a nondescript Standard Life building on Edinburgh’s George Street, we discovered Alan Whicker shooting the breeze with a group of chums.

As marketing gimmicks for new restaurants go, having Alan Whicker sitting at the top of your stairs is a winner. The blazered old traveller and bon viveur looked at home as he rattled off stories about Belize in 1956, Gabon in 1967 and Monaco in the 1970s. But then he might. With a cafe called Vienna, a bar named Milan, the Tokyo nightclub and the Paris restaurant, Le Monde offers an intercontinental tour on the way to the loo.

So, pleased to have chanced upon a television legend, it was with a buoyant heart that we sat down in the bar (the restaurant was full) to enjoy some top-class international cuisine. After such an auspicious start, the only way to go was downhill.

Le Monde’s menu is extensive, but it seems to have been written by someone with a larky sense of humour rather than any concept of how to make a dish sound appealing. Exhibit one: “salmon on a bed of noodles with a lime, chilli and coriander sauce”. Sounds perfectly acceptable, but why label this dish with the appalling name salmon pot noodle? Even this linguistic infelicity was better than the idea of the Scotch eggs: “deep-fried egg yolks on a bed of sweet red onion and grilled black pudding with a latte sauce” — one of the most unpleasant menu descriptions I have ever heard, and, I am willing to bet, one of the most unpleasant dishes, too.

But while we were wincing at these solecisms, it became uncertain whether we were going to be served at all. Despite the fact we had placed our orders, taken delivery of our wine and were waiting in the restaurant’s circular bar, an apologetic waiter appeared and told us the main restaurant was fully booked by a group of 40. When we pointed out that it was restaurant staff who had taken our order and served our drinks, he looked confused. He then informed us that we could eat in the bar, but we would have to wait until the kitchen got the diners in the restaurant served, which could involve a wait of 20 minutes.

Since we had already been waiting 20 minutes, this seemed to be a little rough, but at least it gave us time to admire the decor, on which clearly no expense has been spared. Paris is all sumptuous deep reds, stained-glass windows and polished brass.

As I focused on the mural of the naked ladies, our food suddenly appeared. Have the front-of-house staff learned in the time that Le Monde has been open to get their excuses in early? What made the whole business more ridiculous was the fact we had ordered two cold starters that struck me had been sitting out for hours. The lemon and lime slices alongside the fish were dried up, the melon had a parched quality, and in the middle of my salad was a slimy bit of lettuce at which a rabbit would have turned up its nose.

Still, the next courses arrived promptly. For my main course I had gone for the monkfish scampi, another disastrous bit of misnaming. There were three enormous bits of it — one as large as a Scotch egg, the other two closer in size to a mini sausage roll. The small ones were overdone, with the monkfish dry and tasteless inside; and the large one was cold in the middle.

In this deep-fried disaster zone even the chips were somehow overcooked and soggy at the same time. A difficult dish to get wrong, the penne arrabiata was fine, if a little overcooked.

After all this, we couldn’t summon up any appetite for pudding.

So what is the verdict on Le Monde? Expensive decor, interesting concept, the front-of-house staff are cheery and professional, but there is something going wrong in the kitchen, and it needs to be sorted out quickly.

On first impressions Le Monde is a rather shallow, flashy concept. If they are serious about becoming anything more, they need to get the basics right.

Rating: Le Monde

Food 2/5
Atmosphere 4/5
Service 4/5
Value 3/5
Overall 2/5

Le Monde, 16 George Street, Edinburgh 0131 270 3900. Dinner for two with wine £48

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