The story
Argile is a modern French restaurant at 21 Argyle Place in Edinburgh's Marchmont district. The Good Food Guide rated it Very Good in 2026, and the Michelin Guide lists it as a recommendation.
Jack Montgomery leads the kitchen with a small team of Thomas, Elliot and Scott. He taught himself to cook and, by 19, had worked his way through Escoffier's Guide Culinaire while living above a market in France. He later cooked at Le Jardin des Sens in Montpellier and Restaurant Alain Chapel near Lyon.
The single menu is a frequently changing tasting menu built on Scottish produce, with a contemporary French approach and global influences. Guide reviewers have praised a diced Orkney scallop with juiced olives and fig-leaf oil, and shelled Shetland mussels set on a citron-butter paste. One slow-cooked egg is cooked for 63 minutes until the yolk turns jelly-like. Japanese flavours appear across the menu, from a kombucha glaze to shio koji.
The wine list focuses on small French and European producers working organically or biodynamically, with less common grape varieties. A paired wine flight is offered alongside the menu, and the kitchen matches dishes closely with the glass. Roe deer brushed with black garlic, for example, is served with a Counoise from the Southern Rhône.
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High stools curve around the chef’s counter at this intimate neighbourhood restaurant on a quiet Southside street, where Jack Montgomery and his small team create a seven-course tasting menu for just eight diners. The repertoire is seasonal and the menu can change from day to day; either way, the culinary artistry and acrobatics are flawless right from the start. Openers might bring crisp pastry cups filled with a cloud of creamy burrata foam and grilled quince dusted with fennel pollen on a bed of buckwheat, followed by a dense, fleshy, diced Orkney scallop, its sweetness offset by the umami flavour and earthy funk of juiced olives, fig-leaf oil and fig paste. After that, flashes of Willy Wonka-style experimentation turn the evening into a culinary masterclass: pumpkin pot-roasted with seaweed on walnuts to give it a woodiness; a kombucha ‘scoby’ culture submerged in maple syrup to create a glaze; shelled Shetland mussels, huge and fleshy, on a citron-butter paste made from lemons packed in salt for a year with shio koji (a menthol-fresh rice fermentation). Japanese influences are also evident in other dishes. Slow-cooked egg is a double act: one is cooked for 63 minutes until the yolk has jellified; the other involves trout roe from Paris, swimming in an onion broth cooked for four days with togarashi and pickled enoki mushrooms, plus a slice of Ibérico ham adding salty richness and a hefty shot of Pedro Ximénez on the side. The wine list focuses on small-scale, organic and biodynamic vineyards, and the drinks pairing is part of the experience. Roe deer brushed with homemade black garlic, for example, is matched with a single varietal Counoise from the Southern Rhône, its delicate damson-tinged lightness a perfect match for venison. To conclude, a wood-roasted cherry and black-sesame Bakewell comes with a final nod to Japan – a crème fraîche ‘namelaka’, a silky white chocolate ganache cut with cultured cream to add acidity. Innovative stuff.
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