If you’re looking for cheap eats in Manchester, you’ve come to the right place.
From sushi to shawarma, curries, sandwiches, jerk chicken, burgers, rice, noodles and more, if you’re dining out on a budget (and let’s be honest, who isn’t right now) then we’re here to help.
We’ve pulled a list of some of our favourite go-to spots for a solid scran that won’t break the bank. Keep reading to discover where to put on your list next.
This tiny bakery and shawarma shop in Rusholme is almost too easy to miss. Don’t pass it by, though. This might be one of the best bargains to be had in Manchester.
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The freshly-made naans, filled with shavings of delicately spiced chicken or lamb, salad and sauce, make a great cheap eat – priced at just £2.50 each. Falafel sandwiches will set you back £2, or you can get 3 naan for just £1. Bargain.
Wasabi, Chinatown / Printworks
Credit: Wasabi Manchester
A little bit of Japan in Manchester, Wasabi is known for its sushi and tonkotsu ramen – cooked for a minimum of 18 hours.
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With two sites in the city, one in Chinatown and another in the Printworks, it also has some great value sushi boxes. Even better, at lunch you can get sushi off the belt from just £1.20 a plate.
EatGoody, Universities
Cheap eats near the universities in Manchester at EatGoody. Credit: EatGoody
This popular Korean eatery by the unviersities sells boxes in two sizes. Choose from cubed potatoes, rice, spicy rice or noodles for your base, then opt for specials like chicken curry, tofu tempura bimbim, or veg dumpling curry, depending on the day.
Priced from £5.40 for a regular or £7.40 for a large, you get a lot for your money here either way – but can also opt for add-ons like kimchi salad, boiled and fried eggs.
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Tzatziki’s, Fallowfield
Credit: Eat MCR
Credit: Tzatziki’s
This family-run business in the heart of student land is credited with getting more undergrads through their degrees than any other local eatery.
The gyros here are legendary, but there is loads more to discover too. Dishes are cooked by Greek chefs and draw mostly from Greece, with some wider Mediterranean inspiration. Prices start from just £4.30.
This & That, NQ
This & That is one of Manchester’s best cheap eats restaurants. Image: EATMCR
Probably the first place any self-respecting Manc will point you if you ask for a cheap eats recommendation, This & That’s rice and three cafe is fabled here in the city.
As the name suggests, you get three curries and rice for a fixed price – £4.50 for veg, £5 for two veg and one meat etc. – from a set list of curries that change on a daily basis. Tucked just off the beaten path, find it on Soap street by Trof.
Recently featured in The Guardian, this beloved Hulme Carribean institution is famous for its jerk chicken, veggie stew and lamb chops – and that’s just for starters.
Find stuffed cornmeal patties, blackened whole plantains, rice and peas, fried dumplings, fried squid, fried chicken and more with prices starting from just £1. Meals tend to sit around the £7.50 mark, whilst retro puddings like school dinner cake will cost you £2.50 a pop.
This legendary curry house on Manchester’s curry mile has seen more high-profile musicians walk through its door than most. A favourite of Hit&Run head honcho Rich Reason, for years it was a late-night favourite of clubbers – staying open until 5am.
Post-pandemic, that’s changed and you can only get a scran until 1am now. It’s still a top spot, though. The lamb karahi is the stuff dreams are made of, ditto the chargrilled lamb chops. Curries start from £6.50, burgers from £2.
Rack, Stockport
At Rack, it’s all about the sandwiches. All handmade to order, find ingredients stacked between sourdough or squashed into shiny, buttery brioche.
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Grilled cheese is another speciality, the three-cheese classic served with red onion dipping gravy on the side. Breakfast boxes and salads are also available, with prices starting from £4.40.
Habesha, Gay Village
Image: Flickr
This Ethiopian restaurant, hidden above a takeaway in Manchester’s gay village, has been quietly ticking away for years.
Serving up richly-spiced traditional curries on soft, spongy sourdough-fermented injera bread, at this no-frills joint, it’s all about the food – not your social media pictures. Prices start from £9.
Offering a mix of traditional Tibetan dishes and those with Himalayan roots, Tibetan Kitchen has gained a cult following in South Manchester where it is based.
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Influenced by the food of neighbouring India, China and Nepal, the ever-growing menu is great for vegetarian and vegans and offers many meat and fish options too. Prices start from £6.50.
Go Falafel, NQ / Deansgate
Our go-to in the city centre for fresh falafel, it’s not just the herby chickpea goodness that does it for us here – it’s all the salads, pickles and other ecoutrements too.
Falafel wraps are stuffed with your choice of pickled cabbage, potato, salad, tahini, chilli sauce and lashings of fresh hummus, plus extras like grilled aubergine. There’s salad boxes and freshly squeezed juices too. Prices start from £5.50.
Manchester streaming platform StreamGM unveils four-part creative industry careers podcast
Thomas Melia
A new four-partpodcast by StreamGM featuring some of Greater Manchester’s top creatives has launched with the aim of powering creative careers.
Produced by Rebecca Swarray, a.k.a. ‘RebeccaNeverBecky’ – the founder of the Manchester events and arts collective – this podcast is designed to “ignite and elevate creative careers in music.”
Swarray deep dives into the current Manc music scene and beyond with the help of fellow insiders who vary upon each episode.
There are four parts in this latest series and there’s lots to cover, especially in an industry that’s ever-changing and ever-challenging.
Some of the guests and speakers you can expect to listen to on ‘ICAM’ (In Conversations and Masterclasses)Credit: StreamGM/The Manc Group
Listeners can expect to learn all about ‘Women Behind The Music’ as part of the In Conversations and Masterclasses series with Sophie Bee, Sara Garvey and Kat Brown.
The next episode delves into another key music industry area, ‘Promoters, Venues And Events’, which is broken down by Baz Plug One, Strutty, Tashadean Wood and Liv McCafferty.
‘Artist Development And Management’ features Karen Boardman, Karen Gabay, Damian Morgan, and Via Culpan deep in discussion.
The final episode in this four-part series is ‘Videography And Photography In The Creative Industries’, which sees Johan Reitan, Alice Kanako and Ahmani Vidal talking all things visual.
These four features will be an incredible resource for any creative talents as it put together by professionals for upcoming professionals of any age from any background, race, gender and walk of life.
After all, that’s what is all about, right?
Abbreviated to ‘ICAM’, the podcast is certainly one to check out, with for aspiring artist managers, producers, photographers, promoters—anyone driven to make their mark in music and events.
These podcast sessions understand industry challenges, explore career journeys, creative influences, crisis management and lots more creative field concerns.
You can find the first episode in full down below:
The first episode of the new limited StreamGM podcast.
This run of shows is the second instalment by StreamGM: Greater Manchester’s phenomenal streaming platform dedicated to all things music, nightlife and culture.
Whether you’re a budding creative arts talent or just curious to find out insights into this wonderful innovative industry, you can listen to all the episodes from the series directly on StreamGM HERE.
Elsewhere in Greater Manchester music news, another very special event is kicking off very soon:
Featured Images — Publicity Picture (Supplied)/The Manc Group
City Centre
One of Manchester’s oldest surviving Victorian mills to be repurposed into ‘distinctive’ rental homes
Emily Sergeant
A multi-million funding deal has been agreed to repurpose one of Manchester’s oldest surviving Victorian mills.
After £55 million plans to reimagine Talbot Mill into a 10-storey apartment block began back in May of last year, social impact developers Capital&Centric have now agreed a £37 million deal with Paragon Bank to finance the restoration of the historic mill and repurpose it into 190 new distinctive properties for rent.
Built in 1855 overlooking the canal, the imposing red-brick mill on Ellesmere Street in the Castlefield neighbourhood was the product of Manchester’s textile boom.
One of the city’s last massive mills to be restored, it was Talbot that spearheaded the rapid transformation of the Cornbrook area from undeveloped land to a powerful industrial hub in the late 19th century, before going on to dominate the local cotton industry in the early 1900s.
It was even used as a mushroom farm in the 1980s, while more recently, it has been the set of a period drama and a massive art exhibition.
But when the restoration is complete, over half the development will be newly-built and will offer residents of the nearly 200 ‘distinctive’ apartments a lush hidden garden, with plenty of green spaces to meet and hang out, while still managing to celebrate the mill’s past and retain loads of original features.
Capital&Centric is developing Talbot Mill as an investment, which it will retain for rent once finished.
This is something the developers have already done successfully on a number of sites in recent years, especially in its lengthy run of restoring Manchester’s iconic listed buildings and mixing the old in with the new.
One of Manchester’s oldest surviving Victorian mills will be repurposed into ‘distinctive’ rental homes / Credit: Capital&Centric
“We love to restore and repurpose historic buildings,” explained Tom Wilmot, who is the joint managing director at Capital&Centric.
“But as one of Manchester’s oldest mills, Talbot Mill is something a bit different, so we’re buzzing to be bringing it back to its former glory, [as] it had a huge role to play in the industrial revolution in the city and now it gets to be part of the city’s future.
“We’re retaining as many features as we can, to keep the history of the mill alive and so that our residents can enjoy becoming custodians of the past whilst enjoying all the trappings of modern-day living.”
Georgina Pellant -
15th February 2022 
