emba

Divine lunch here today. Relaxed vibe, excellent staff and service. Highly recommended, we will definitely return ❤️

Fantastic food, friendly team, great cocktails

Best restaurant in leeds

Just the most amazing meal I’ve had in a while. There were 3 of us and we started with a mango margarita, red wine and daiquiri (FABULOUS!). We ordered 5 small plates between us then for large plates we got the pork, lamp chops and catch of the day between us. David was our server and he was just a delight❤️ The best unreal fine dining experience that I’ve had in Leeds (which I don’t say lightly).

Raving about Emba. Delicious food, fish cooked to perfection. Don’t miss out! Huge congratulations to Liz and team for a roaring success.

Absolutely incredible food in a gorgeous, relaxed setting by the canal. Every dish we had was remarkable and you can't go wrong with anything on the menu. Perfection 👌

Went last Saturday and it was fantastic. Watching the canal boats and swans out the window as well as more homely feel made for a great chilled out atmosphere. The staff were absolutely brilliant and the food was delicious. Will definitely be back

Such a lovely experience at Emba! The food was exceptional and had a real luxury feel to it, staff were lovely, and dietary requirements were catered to so well. Highly recommend

I booked Emba for my wedding reception and they were fantastic. Gorgeous food, ambience and the staff were brilliant. We all had such a great time and will be going back!

Fantastic food and service. Very friendly and knowledgeable staff and great atmosphere. Eaten from lunch menu as well as tasting. Highly recommend.

Just eaten at this new restaurant. It's amazing. Go soon before you can't get in. Head Chef Liz Cottam already has a track record for great food in great spaces and, based on what we've just had, that record is set to continue. We started with a cocktail - a spicy margherita with mango - an unusual but perfect aperitif. I so want the recipe. We then moved on to small plates of fascinating food to be talked about and shared. There are main courses too if you're really hungry and just want what's yours. We shared kaffir crab souffle, tomatoes, beef tartare, garlic potatoes, pea and asparagus. Every dish was sensational. The pea and asparagus though was standout. An explosion of fresh, English flavours with a amazing dressing. The kaffir crab souffle was also fantastic. Service was excellent with attentive and chatty people. Emba feels like more than simply a restaurant. The food is creative but with a fluidity about it. That, coupled with the friendly, relaxed atmosphere makes it feel almost like a secret food club - Add the picturesque location on the canal in Leeds, Emba is an exciting new restaurant which I can't wait to visit again. Anyway gotta go - I'm not a dessert person so I ordered another Mango Margherita which has just arrived and the sun is just coming around to the outside space!

Hard to come up with anything else but WOW. Liz Cottam has knocked it out of the park once again. The friendliness, knowledge and excitement of the staff is obvious as soon as you come in. Special mention to the crab kyiv, scallops and sirloin with sexy sauce. I’m still thinking of them days later. Emba is a real gem and a true mix of amazing food in a wonderful setting, can’t wait to go back.

We had the scallops, crab cake, Côte de boeuf with garlic potatoes, milk bomb and apple crumble. The food was rich with big flavours. I had to order some bread to mop up the bone marrow sauce to ensure none was wasted. Will definitely be back.

A quietish Thursday night, but an outstanding meal, one of the best I’ve had this year. Great advice from the young man who served us. We loved the cooked oysters in beef fat, the sweetbreads, the venison tartare and the crab…and the steak…and the turbot…and the prawns. The four puddings were all great. Treacle tart stand out. Just go. I’ve recommended it to loads of people today.

We booked Emba on the back of a few recommendations from friends, so we arrived with pretty high expectations and somehow it still completely blew our minds. We shared a few small plates to start, the scallop was the absolute standout, cooked perfectly with this spicy butter sauce we could genuinely have drunk by the glass. For mains I had the fish and my partner had the steak. The steak was easily the best either of us have ever tasted and the fish came with a sauce that was creamy and delicate, yet still packed massive flavour. We mixed it up with cocktails and wine too and you can tell both are thought through with just as much care as the food. Clearly great ingredients in the hands of a skilled team. Worth every penny. GO.

Fantastic food and service. The tasting menu was full of surprises, but the crab was the star. I strongly suggest going here before it achieves the inevitable Michelin star and it becomes harder to visit. Friendly and attentive hospitality, but a really relaxed neighbourhood vibe. Genuinely wonderful.

A fabulous Sunday lunch to celebrate my son for passing his driving test. The Chef & staffs are friendly and knowledgeable. We are having the tasting menu, every dishes are delicious and celebrate the seasonal products with pairing wines. It’s a wonderful experience. Worth to make a 3 hours trip!

Finally got to visit after meaning to for ages. I loved Home and was so happy when Liz opened Emba. Food is gorgeous and the restaurant is really bright and cozy. Staff are all lovely as you'd expect. We got the tasting menu with paired wine.

I just love the relaxed atmosphere at emba and the menu changes regularly according to season and always inspires me to choose something different. The duck with burnt honey was to die for. The wines are always carefully chosen and the staff knowledgeable- I’m always happy to go with the parings or recommendations. Back soon for more!

Excellent meal with brilliant service. Clearly high quality ingredients and a true reflection of the Leeds food scene. We went a la carte and had a selection of small plates and the lobster special to share as a main. £125 very reasonable for two people with a glass of wine each. Would 100% return and a great place to go for people visiting Leeds.

Had an amazing time here recently for my brother’s wedding! Food was exceptional (make sure you order the tomato and whipped feta salad). Location is so lovely, right on the canal. But most of all, the care they took of my son who is anaphylactic to eggs and dairy was second to none. The chef actually spoke to me personally to discuss all his needs and explain how they had addressed them, preparing a lovely three course meal for him while ensuring no cross contamination. It’s rare that a restaurant goes to this much effort (nor do I expect them to as I know it’s a big ask with everything else they have going on) and it really put my mind at ease, meaning I could enjoy the wedding and gorgeous meal without having to worry. Could not recommend Emba more highly!!

We visited on a busy Saturday night. The team were genuinely attentive throughout and made us feel really looked after, even with how busy they were. The food was so good, some of the best I’ve eaten in a long time. Big thanks to Evie for looking after us so well

Probably the best restaurant I've been to this year. Sublime food and excellent service. My favourite was the crab soufflé and the porterhouse pork chop. The only thing I didn't like so much is how cold and hard the space is - it can be loud.

Food was lovely, service was exceptional very well informed about all dishes. Servers are passionate about what they do. Duck confit was a tad over done but other than that perfect

A successor of Home that was previously located at Brewery wharf. With a much more casual vibe but still maintaining a high standard of food quality. It is my second visit to the restaurant and I was pleased to see even though some of the main component of dishes were the same, the seasonings and flavour profiles were completely different. The yuzu scallops were a standout in this visit. Whilst I had a good time, it wasn't as good as their previous establishment where it truly felt special. Perhaps that is their vision with it being more accessible, but at their cost range it feels it needs something more to justify the price. As someone with gluten intolerance, it was very nice of them to print me an alcarte menu clearly labelled with what I could have. I do hope in the future they are open to giving more dietary options in their set menu.

I'd been wanting to try Emba for a while and finally made it on Saturday. Overall it was very good but not outstanding for a couple of reasons. Whilst the dishes are lovely, small plate portions are very much on the small side, which means you need 5-6 courses for two.. It adds up. The desserts.. Not really to our taste. Both the milk bomb and the Tonka marshmallow were on the bitter side. Star of the show.. The oysters. I can't fault the staff, lovely people. I can see why it's in Michelin guide now, but it's not star worthy compared to other top end places in Yorkshire, but I think that's the space they are going for. I'll go back to try a few of the large plates and update and I hope it works.

The restaurant is cute, with a nice river view, and the staff are friendly. Overall the experience was fun. However, we feel that the taster menu today doesn’t quite meet the fine dining standard we expected for this price (85pp excluding service). The whole menu feels rather dense and heavy, starting from the first bread dish. Some courses repeated in texture and flavour （e.g. Celeriac and catch are next to each other, but are both creamy. The third dish, Tartare, came with fried bread again, after the first dish being fried bread). One dish was too salty for us, and a few others didn’t feel well balanced, with some ingredients overpowering the rest.

Good food and service. Would have been nice if given hand towels for courses eaten using hands.

This was the first time that I had been since the change from Owl. The food was excellent but I have a couple of points which dropped my rating to 4. Firstly, there were no nibbles to accompany the bread at the start and secondly, there was no surprise pre-desert. Both of these were always present when it was Owl. The addition of partitions is a good thing as it makes the space seem more intimate and also quieter. My only other comment is with the wine glasses. They are stemless and while that is fine with red wine, I would prefer stemmed glasses for white with as you don't warm the wine with your hand.

Left a little disappointed after trying out Emba recently- we used to love Owl and had taken part in a crowd funding campaign a few months prior which got us a voucher for a tasting menu for 2 - lots of confusion when we arrived and initially we were shown a 5 course tasting menu but then it was reduced to 3 courses. Despite the confusion service was very friendly. Starter and main was nice, dessert was excellent (a Jaffa cake style thing that we loved). No bread/nibbles prior to starter which we used to enjoy with Owl, no acknowledgement that we'd helped crowdfund. Will probably leave it a while before maybe trying again.

Very much enjoyed the tasting menu and the wine pairing. Lots of great flavours and some unusual but perfectly paired wines.

After being a regular customer at the owl we left quite disappointed after a birthday meal. Staff acknowledged at the start it was a birthday however nothing extra was offered (not that it was expected but prior experience at the owl we would assume a small token would be offered) Monkfish large plate was the same size as the epic prawn small plate, side of potatoes was rather stingy. We left feeling quite hungry even after dessert which was sweet with not much depth. my cocktail was also very stingy on the serving size (friends margarita was full to the brim where as my daquri looked like someone had drank half!) Would maybe visit again for drinks and snacks as the staff were lovely but the concept of gastrobar seemed confused.

The food was superb, but, out of the nine food options we chose five were not available, not great on such a small menu. I would also recommend the heating has a degree added to it. Servers were very friendly and welcoming.

We had a meal at Emba last night and overall enjoyed the experience. The atmosphere was chilled, and the staff were extremely attentive and knowledgeable about the dishes. They were also very good at keeping our wine and water glasses topped up without being intrusive. We started with a cooked oyster before our starters. My husband chose the chicken broth option and thoroughly enjoyed it, while I opted for the seaweed version. Unfortunately, mine arrived without the crumb as described on the menu, which was a little disappointing, and I was undecided on it overall. For starters, I had the scallops, which were divine in flavour and beautifully cooked with a yuzu and lime sauce. However, there were only two small scallops on the plate, and at £24 I would have expected at least three, so that felt slightly underwhelming in terms of value. My husband had the crab soufflé, which was absolutely delicious. For mains, I chose the monkfish. While nicely presented, I found it a little watery, almost as though it had been recently frozen, which unfortunately diluted the accompanying sauce. Again given the price of the dish £37, this was disappointing. My husband’s beef short rib, served with cabbage and potatoes sides, was excellent - tender, flavourful, and very well executed. We were also disappointed to find that there were only two dessert options available. For a restaurant of this standard and price point, we would have expected a broader selection to choose from, which limited the overall dining experience somewhat. Overall, a restaurant with a good atmosphere and attentive service, with some standout dishes, but a few elements that didn’t quite match the pricing.

A bit disappointed with the service as when we pointed out to the staff that the fish not fresh, our concern was completely disregarded. The next day two of my friend told me they had upset stomach and had bad diarrhoea for the whole day. It’s such a beautiful restaurant, all other food were lovely but unfortunately when things gone wrong, the team did not get the opportunity to rectify it.