‘This chippy tea just isn’t quite big enough’, said no one ever – but Brewski’s gone and launched a new chippy-inspired platter anyway.
The much-loved Chorlton restaurant, famed for its outrageous boards and sharing platters, has now taken on the classic British takeaway favourite.
Enormous boards are piled high with battered fish, suet pudding, chip barms, mushy peas, scraps, and battered sausages – but all with a Brewski twist, naturally.
First up is the fish and chip staple, battered haddock. Here, it’s fried in a batter made with gin and Marmite, adding an umami flavour as well as a bit of colour.
And did you know that gin has a low boiling temperature, so it helps to get an even crispier batter platter.
Next up on the £55 Batter Platter are the chip butties, supersized with buffalo chicken poutine and perfect skin-on salty fries.
Whatever sauce you go for on your chippy tea usually, Brewski has an elevated version.
The chicken poutine chip butties on Brewski’s Batter PlatterHomemade katsu curry sauce
They’ve used a warming Katsu curry sauce and then made a gravy using the same base as their French onion soup, laced with brandy and port.
Another old-school staple is suet pudding – Brewski are serving theirs filled with beef shin and nduja ragu, which is steamed and brushed in garlic butter.
The battered sausage arrives with a coating of chipotle sour cream, bacon bits, and crispy onions, and the batter itself has tequila and nduja in it.
And something you won’t see at most chippies, but which will have us running back to Chorlton at the drop of a hat, is the tacos made with mushy peas and scraps. Delicious.
The Batter Platter is available at Brewski in Chorlton now.
Brewski’s battered sausage on the Batter PlatterInside the delicious suet pudding. Credit: THe Manc Group
Lively Irish pub Nancy Spains set to open in Manchester for the first time
Daisy Jackson
An Irish bar famed for its live music is heading up to Manchester for the first time, and is promising £2.50 pints to lure us in.
Nancy Spains will be venturing out of London for the first time promising to bring the ‘ultimate traditional Irish pub experience’ to the Northern Quarter.
If you were to ask what the hottest trend in hospitality is right now the answer would, apparently, be Guinness. We’re drowning in the stuff.
This latest opening is more about Murphy’s, another Irish stout, than Guinness (they actually won’t serve Guinness at all) but the craic will be much the same.
Nancy Spains is actually set to open almost directly opposite the aforementioned Salmon of Knowledge, taking over the former Corner Boy unit on Stevenson Square in the heart of Manchester.
To celebrate its opening, the pub will be serving its first 5000 pints of Murphy’s for just £2.50, so that it can show off the atmosphere that’s established it as ‘one of London’s favourite pubs’.
They’re promising an array of Irish whiskeys behind the bar, live music performances, and a lively late-night setting.
Nancy Spains was set up by three brothers who travelled all over their home county of rural Kerry researching Irish pubs, before launching two venues down in London.
They want it to balance a traditional pub with the vibrancy of the city.
Peter O’Halloran, co-founder of Nancy Spains commented, “We’re so excited to be launching in Manchester, bringing Nancy Spains to the heart of the Northern Quarter.
“After the success of our two venues in London, it was only right to bring Nancy Spains’ infectious spirit and Irish pride to Manchester. Slainte!”
Nancy Spains will open its first Manchester pub on Saturday 15 March at 21 Hilton Street.
Lucky Mama’s – The Italian restaurant serving pasta in a dough bowl and ‘pregnant’ pizzas
Daisy Jackson
Lucky Mama’s is a local sensation, thanks to its slightly whacky but delicious Italian creations like pasta served in a bowl made of pizza dough and its latest offering, a ‘pregnant’ pizza.
What on Earth is a pregnant pizza, you ask? Firstly we should stress this is a nickname we’ve bestowed upon the dish, rather than Lucky Mama’s chosen branding.
But essentially it’s a helping of fresh pasta that’s folded into the bubble crust of the pizza, like a half-calzone.
Lucky Mama’s started life when founders Mamadou Dhiam and Gaby Santos set up a trailer in their backyard in Eccles in the depths of lockdown.
But thanks to a formidably loyal following that’s spread the word of Lucky Mama’s far and wide, it now has two pretty pink restaurants in Greater Manchester.
Back in 2022, they threw open the doors to their Chorlton restaurant, before returning back to home turf for spot number two in Monton in 2024.
The recipes are fresh and pretty authentically Italian up until the last step, when they throw a curveball by loading their pasta into unconventional vessels.
‘Pregnant’ pizzas at Lucky Mama’sTraditional Roman pizzasLucky Mama’s pink restaurant in Chorlton
Their pasta pizza bowls are what they’re best known for and they fly out of the kitchen – this is where pizza dough is placed around a metal bowl before being baked in an oven.
Then it’s piled high with freshly made pasta, with popular flavours like cacio e pepe, mushroom alfredo, and rasta pasta.
Pasta is available in a regular ceramic bowl too.
You’ll find Lucky Mama’s at 565 Barlow Moor Road in Chorlton; and 217 Monton Road in Eccles.
Daisy Jackson -
21st February 2024 
