Gone but not forgotten: Fat Sam's in Edinburgh

When it came to finding a location for a 1920s New York/Chicago gangster themed restaurant, Edinburgh’s former meat market building in Fountainbridge was an inspired choice.

Fat Sam’s opening in 1986 coincided with an inventive marketing campaign that involved actors cutting about Edinburgh in a Godfather-style motorcar and dressed in pin stripe suits and fedoras.

Not to be confused with the Dundee night club of the same name, Fat Sam’s proved to be hugely popular burger and steak joint for the city’s families to enjoy an evening together for the next 14 years.

Entertainment was supplied by the Fat Sam’s jazz band every Wednesday and an extremely comical-looking robotic gangster band on the other days of the week.

Customers with sufficiently-large appetites were presented with a token ‘I Survived Fat Sam’s’ pin badge on completion of their meal.

Despite its popularity, the restaurant closed for good in 2000 and the building razed to the ground 7 years later to make way for a new office and retail development.

Also formerly the entrance to the legendary Americana nightclub in the 1970s, the 1884 meat market’s iconic arches are all that remain of Fat Sam's today, albeit situated a little further down the road.

The name Fat Sam’s is understood to have been derived from the 1976 gangster musical comedy Bugsy Malone, which starred child actors, such as Jodie Foster, Scott Baio and John Cassini, playing adult roles.

The film told the story of the rise of "Bugsy Malone" and the power struggle between "Fat Sam" and "Dandy Dan".

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