There’s a new restaurant in Manchester dedicated to the world’s greatest food item – pie.
Great North Pie Co is ready to open the doors to its first city centre venue, after establishing itself in Altrincham Market.
Its award-winning pies have been cropping up on pub menus and at farmers markets ever since, as well as in their own site in Ambleside in the Lake District.
And now the team have taken charge of a cosy unit at Kampus, with booth-style seating for up to 20 people, plus an outside (rain-proof) terrace overlooking the neighbourhood’s lush gardens.
On the menu are classic pies stuffed to the brim with quality ingredients from around the North West.
Flavour combinations include Lancashire cheese and onion pie, made with Dewlay’s tasty Lancashire cheese and caramelised onion, and a 14-hour braised beef and ale pie, with Manchester Union Lager and redcurrant jelly.
Great North Pie Co. Credit: The Manc Group
There’ll be regular specials, like the current dish of minted lamb suet pudding with chip shop curry sauce and some of the best chips in Manchester.
Every pie can be ordered with a range of sides, from mash to chips to mushy peas to pickled red cabbage.
For dessert, you’ve currently got one option, and it’s a good one – a proper chocolate pudding, served steaming hot and swimming in chocolate custard.
The menu will change seasonally, but what you’re guaranteed of is a huge bowl of comforting, proper northern grub, served in one of the city’s cosiest and most picturesque settings.
The drinks menu includes the likes of Manchester Union Lager on draught, a selection of quality wines and proseccos, plus a handful of spritz style cocktails.
Once the site opens on Monday 27 February, there’ll be breakfast sandwiches served daily between 10:30am and 2.30pm, plus cold pies to take home with you.
Neil Broomfield, co-founder of Great North Pie Co, said: “Since we started making pies it’s always been an ambition to have a base in the city centre. We’d been looking for a while and as soon as we saw Kampus, Little David Street and the gardens, we knew it was the right place for us.
“While it’s our first city centre venue, we don’t have plans to rollout out any more, as we place our focus on keeping the quality and consistency we aim for. We just want to concentrate on doing one thing and doing it well. The mix of traders coming into Kampus is amazing and we’re so proud to be part of it.”
Featured image: The Manc Group
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.
Daisy Jackson -
23rd February 2023 
