A chef near Greater Manchester has expressed his disbelief after his pub was named one of the best in the UK.
Luke Payne, who is both head chef and co-owner of The Pack Horse in Hayfield, tweeted his delight yesterday after his pub was ranked as one of the country’s finest offerings.
The ‘seasonal, contemporary gastropub’ in Hayfield, which is located near Kinder Scout in the Peak District, has been named as one of the top 50 gastropubs for 2022.
Swadale heritage breed pork chop with its own crackling, Navarrico Judion beans in a leek, garlic and smoked pig stock cassoulet, and salsa verde / Image: The Pack Horse Hayfield
Writing “thank you, thank you, thank you” on his Twitter, the chef tweeted his heartfelt thanks to all of those who had supported the pub during the voting process and helped them make it into the prestigious top 50 list.
“The top 50. Wow. I genuinely didn’t think we would do it,” he wrote, seemingly in disbelief.
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The news comes after the pub ‘sneaked’ into the 2021 long list at number 79, following one of the most difficult periods for hospitality in recent history.
Each year, Top 50 Gastropubs list fifty of the best in the country (although we know all too well in the north that there are many, many more than that, being particularly spoilt in this part of the country).
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Last year, however, the guide extended its list to 100 in a bid to encourage more diners to get out and spend money in their local venues.
At the time, list Editor Nicholas Robinson told the Morning Advertiser: “What’s great about gastropubs is the diversity of the food they offer. It’s not all fine dining with foams and gels, but a real mix of high-end, refined restaurant quality dishes mixed with pub classics and simple food.”
Image: The Pack Horse Hayfield
Image: The Pack Horse Hayfield
“But what ties all amazing gastropubs together is the quality of their ingredient, the skill of the chefs behind the dishes and the environment you eat in.”
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At The Pack Horse Hayfield, there are several menus on offer: an a la carte, a bar snack menu, and a Sunday roast list.
Regularly changing to fit the seasons, those that appear on the website are sample menus just to give you a flavour for the variety on offer.
A Sunday Roast at the award-winning pub, officially listed in the Top 50 Gastropubs for 2022 / Image: The Pack Horse Hayfield
With a snacks section offering everything from rock oysters (served raw or Korean-style) to Manchester eggs and Cobble Lane charcuterie; and starters ranging from High Peak lamb kofte to Loch Fyne diver scallops and Cured chalk stream trout, the menu is certainly a varied one.
Elsewhere, impressive-sounding mains listed on the sample a la carte include the likes of local estate venison loin wellington with a pickled walnut duxelles, Swaledale mutton rogan josh, and a wild rabbit and smoked pig’s head pie with its own liquor.
As for pudding, crowd-pleasing favourites include poached pears, vanilla creme brulee with shortbread, salted caramel custard tart, pistachio cream, or Baron Bigod cheese served with a treacle and walnut malt loaf and balsamic onions.
It’s easy – for us at least – to see why the Pack Horse has made it onto the list. We think Luke Payne is just being very modest, which is rather charming actually.
To find out more and book a visit, head to the pub’s website here.
95% of Mancs apparently want the city to be ‘cashless’, new study reveals
Emily Sergeant
An eye-opening new study has found that only 5% of Mancs still use cash as their preferred method of payment nowadays.
It comes as no surprise that cash is less of a ‘king’ nowadays than it used to be, but now a new report by global financial technology company SumUp has suggests that only 5% of people in Manchester prefer to pay with cash, while 59% choose debit and credit cards, so that leaves one question… is Manchester on its way to becoming a cashless city?
To discover how payment preferences are evolving, SumUp conducted a nationwide survey to gather insights from UK consumers about their payment habits.
The company was particularly intrigued to not only discover payment methods people prefer, but what their concerns around certain payment methods, alongside how they feel about businesses that don’t accept digital payments.
95% of Mancs apparently want the city to be ‘cashless’ / Credit: Mylo Kaye (via Unsplash) | Pexels
Firstly, before we go any further, it’s important to note that almost two thirds (63%) of Manchester residents said they have changed the way they make payments over the past year.
Unsurprisingly, debit and credit cards remain the top choice for the majority of Mancs, with over half (59%) saying it was their preferred method of payment, followed by mobile payment methods such as Apple Pay and Google Pay at 24% – which is likely thanks to their ease of use and the ability to have multiple cards on one device.
While a third (31%) of Mancs said that they ‘don’t mind’ cash and still opt to carry it for situations where digital payments aren’t an option, a growing number of people in the city are feel that digital payments are more favourable, with 25% thinking that businesses should adapt to modern payment methods and whilst 28% finding it ‘inconvenient’ when a business doesn’t accept digital payments.
A further 11% of people even say that cash-only businesses wouldn’t be an option they’d consider, and would actually avoid them wherever possible.
Only 5% use cash as their preferred method of payment / Credit: Rawpixel
When it comes to concerns around digital payment methods, where do Mancs stand then? Well, the survey found that a third (33%) of people are worried about their reliance on technology, especially being unable to pay if their phone dies, for example, while an additional 32% of people are concerned about security risks such as hacking, fraud, or stolen card details.
Among other things, 26% of survey respondents also said they worry about the privacy aspect of digital banking and the tracking your data.
“While debit and credit cards continue to dominate as the preferred payment method, it’s clear that cash is slowly declining in use, particularly among younger generations,” Corin Camenisch, who is the Marketing & Growth Lead at SumUp, commented on the report.
“Looking ahead, we can anticipate a rise in innovative payment methods like digital wallets, especially as younger consumers increasingly embrace the convenience and flexibility they offer.”
Featured Image – Pavel Danilyuk (via Pexels)
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Met Office predicts UK is set for ‘hotter than average’ summer
Emily Sergeant
The Met Office is predicting that the UK is set for a ‘hotter than average’ summer this year.
Fresh off-the-back of the news that 2025 is already the hottest spring on record, with a recorded 630 hours of sunshine from 1 March until 27 May, beating out the previous sunniest spring in 2020 by just four hours, the Met Office is now predicting that the UK is on the verge of a summer that’s ‘hotter than usual’.
According to its three-month outlook, the Met Office has predicted that it’s 2.3 times more-likely than ‘normal’ that it will be hot in the UK between 1 June and 31 August.
The average temperatures during those months are set to range from 10-17°C.
🌡️ ☀️ The UK has recorded its warmest and sunniest spring on record, according to provisional Met Office statistics.
Spring 2025 is now the 4th sunniest season overall for the UK, with only 3 summers sunnier since 1910.
Details in release below, or read this short thread 👇🧵
After it was revealed that this has also been the UK’s driest spring in more than a century, meteorologists are warning Brits that there could heatwave conditions could be reached at various times throughout the summer.
The release of the long-range forecast – which gives an indication of possible temperatures, rainfall, and wind speed over a period as a whole – comes after temperatures soared to 8°C (46F) above the average for this time of year this Saturday just gone (31 May).
It is important to note, however, that the Met Office thinks these predicted temperatures are similar to those in recent years, and it does not guarantee ‘prolonged’ hot weather.
The Met Office is predicting that the UK is set for ‘hotter than average’ summer this year / Credit: Mylo Kaye (via Unsplash)
The Met Office said in a statement: “While the current three-month outlook shows an increased chance of a hot summer, the temperature signals for this summer are similar to those for recent years and consistent with our warming climate.
“The increased chance of hotter than average temperatures is not a guarantee of prolonged hot weather or heatwaves, but it does mean that heatwave conditions could be reached at times.
“However, it’s important to bear in mind that an increased chance of hot conditions could also reflect a mix of hot and cool days, warm nights, or less extreme levels of warmth rather than continual heatwave conditions specifically.”
Georgina Pellant -
14th December 2021 
