Restaurant goes to the dogs after new owner steps up

ONE of Edinburgh's most distinctive restaurants has been taken over a month after it closed following the death if its founding father and owner.

The Tijuana Yacht Club on Hanover Street – recognisable by its eye-catching turquoise frontage – is to be re-branded by restaurateur David Ramsden.

Mr Ramsden, who also runs the fashionable Apartment on Barclay Place and opened the former Fitz Henry restaurant on Leith's waterfront, will call the restaurant The Dogs and will abandon the Mexican theme, replacing it with a British-styled menu and including more Scottish produce.

Bronislav Jac Barzecki – nicknamed "Yatts" – died suddenly in December. He opened what was Gringo Bill's in the early 1990s before creating the Tijuana Yacht Club soon after.

Mr Ramsden said: "Yatts had a thriving trade with the Yacht Club. His food was pan-American but what I have in mind for The Dogs is a menu with as British a twist as I can make it.

"What I envisage for The Dogs is a restaurant that will be fast, furious, fun and noisy.

"And I have to thank Kenny Waugh Senior, the landlord who has given me a ten-year lease of the premises."

Mr Ramsden, who also opened Monster Mash on Forrest Road, hopes to open the new venue by the end of February.

He said that although he began his career in Leith he always dreamed of having a location in a place like Hanover Street, adding that he saw his future " in the city centre where the action is".

"I was determined to stay in the licensed trade and I consider myself fortunate to have found a pitch on Hanover Street, one of the busiest streets in Edinburgh for restaurants and bars," he added.

"It is 13 years since I opened Fitz Henry – it seems an eternity. You might say I have been in the woods these last couple of years."

Mr Barzecki enjoyed a reputation as one of the Capital's top restaurateurs.

He began his career managing The Bailie bar in Stockbridge before going on to other city pubs and then eventually opening the Hanover Street venture. Hundreds attended his funeral last month after the father-of-one died at the age of 58.