Eat Well MCR has officially launched ‘Marketplace’ – an online shop selling produce and meal kits from the region’s best restaurants, growers, producers and makers – today.
The Marketplace comes after a successful six months for Eat Well MCR – launched by founder Mary Ellen McTague in response to the growing food crisis worsened by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic – and will see all the profits generated go directly back into Eat Well MCR’s other focus of producing and distributing meals for the vulnerable in the Greater Manchester region.
This his new one-stop-shop will feature a star lineup each week of top quality fruit and veg from Manchester Urban Diggers, selected cuts from Littlewoods Butchers, cheeses from the renowned Courtyard Dairy, gorgeous natural wines, and they’ve not forgotten the treats either, with Krum, Siop Shop and Pollen are all involved too.
Every week, different restaurants – Honest Crust, The Creameries, Elite Bistros and Tampopo – will also offer the best ready meals and meal kits you’ll ever get your hands on.
Pippy Eats’ notoriously difficult-to-snag crispy chilli oil will be available alongside Into the Gathering Dusk’s intricately crafted homemade vermouths and concoctions, ready to be poured over ice whilst you wait for the oven to warm up.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CF1u5ZZA-J0/
In bringing the best in local produce, provisions and delicious booze to your door every week, Eat Well MCR is able to direct all profits into continuing their work for the Greater Manchester community and provide nutritious meals cooked with love to those most in need.
The organic veg boxes and locally farmed meat are sourced from within a 50 mile radius of Manchester.
This allows the collective to extend their support to the region’s farmers and the wider supply chain, who are all caught up in the collateral damage caused by the impact the COVID-19 crisis has had on the hospitality industry.
Speaking on the launch of Marketplace, Mary Ellen McTague – Founder of Eat Well MCR – said: “We are so proud of what we created during the lockdown.
“Since we started all this, two things have become very clear to us – firstly that we couldn’t lose the momentum we had gathered; we have an incredible group of people doing incredible things. And secondly, the businesses in our collective have thankfully reopened so we knew it was imperative to evolve in order to continue.
“Food inequality is endemic in Greater Manchester and we are not about to walk away from that.
Thanks to those fabulous people who have supported us and bought through the Eat Well Marketplace. We love you 🧡 pic.twitter.com/SMuOUq9FQX
She continued: “Manchester is ringed by wonderful growers, producers and makers.
“We also wanted to shine a light on them through the Marketplace, and support our local food economy during a tough time whilst holding our main goal of helping to tackle food inequality at the heart of what we do.”
Orders for the first round of deliveries from the Marketplace can be placed between 12pm on Friday 2nd October – 5pm on Monday 5th October, with the first deliveries being fulfilled on Friday 9th and Saturday 10th October.
Click-and-collect services from Cloudwater Brewery will also be available on these dates.
You can find more about the Marketplace from Eat Well MCR here.
Eats
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.
Emily Sergeant -
2nd October 2020 
