Eats

The 2024 British Street Food Awards land in Manchester next month

We're getting hungry just thinking about it.

Danny Jones Danny Jones - 22nd July 2024

Manchester’s culinary scene speaks for itself, with some of the best restaurants and street vendors you’ll find anywhere in the country – yeah, we said it – so it only seems right that the British Street Food Awards would also wash up on our shores.

The annual celebration of the very best street food the UK has to offer, which also forms part of the wider European Street Food Awards (ESFA), is broken up into regions and this year’s Northern final is taking place right here in Manchester city centre.

Set to take place at Freight Island, where there’ll also be live entertainment as well as plenty of food and drink on top of the competition and ceremony itself, this year’s awards are set to attract a massive and very hungry Manc crowd.

Taking place over a full weekend, we can’t think of many better ways to spend our time.

Credit: Supplied

So how does it work? Well, the British Street Food Awards (BSFA) brings together top street food traders to compete for the British Street Food Awards ‘Northern Champion’.

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The Northern finalists are set to showcase their one killer signature dish for a judging panel. This year’s judges are still yet to be revealed but previous panels have welcomed the likes of Michelin-star chefs and acclaimed food writers such as Ed Cooke, Richard Corrigan, Gizzi Erskine, Giorgio Locatelli, and more.

Following this stage, successful regional finalists then take their dishes to the UK final in London on 13-15 September as they compete for the ultimate domestic award: the prestigious British Street
Food Awards Champion.

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From there, the sky’s the limit and they can go on to compete in ESFA, whose grand final takes place in Germany later this year.

Past winners include popular names such as Wingmans, MEATliquor, BAO and more. The event promises a weekend filled with mouth-watering dishes, vibrant atmospheres, and the chance to discover the next
big name in street food. Safe to say we know a thing or two about that around here.

Credit: The Manc Eats (Where to eat in Piccadilly Street Food Village Part I)/Supplied

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In addition to the obvious wealth of food offerings at your disposal over the weekend, there’ll also be a performance by Alexis Taylor of Hot Chip on the Sunday, as well as live sets by Body Heat DJs.

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The competition itself not only showcases the finest in street cuisine but also offers food enthusiasts the unique opportunity to vote for their favourite vendor in The People’s Choice award. Both The People’s Choice and the Northern Champion will be announced on the final day of the awards.

The British Street Food Awards regional final for the North West takes place at Freight Island on Saturday, 17 and Sunday, 18 August from 12 pm until 6pm. You can book your tickets to the Northern edition of the 2024 British Street Food Awards HERE.

Until then, we highly recommend you feast your eyes on what is just a taster of one of the very best street food hubs in our wonderful city – though we’ll pre-warn you, the mouth will water…

For all the latest news, events and goings on in Greater Manchester, subscribe to The Manc newsletter HERE.

Featured Images — Supplied/The Manc Eats

Eats

Acclaimed restaurant staffed by prison inmates announces sad closure

Daisy Jackson Daisy Jackson The Clink restaurant in Styal is closing

The Clink, an acclaimed restaurant where the food is prepared and served by prison inmates, has announced its devastating closure.

The charity behind the restaurant, which is attached to HMP Styal, has confirmed that it will close for good on 31 July 2025.

The Clink is famed for the training and experience it provides inmates, helping them to get a head start into the hospitality industry when their sentence ends.

It’s also achieved plenty of acclaim as a restaurant in its own right, consistently being rated as the best restaurant in Wilmslow and voted Cheshire Restaurant of the Year in 2024.

Over the years, hundreds of students have earned qualifications including City & Guilds NVQs in Food and Beverage Service, Professional Cookery and Food Hygiene.

The Clink restaurant in Styal is closing
The Clink restaurant in Styal is closing
The Clink restaurant in Styal is closing

But The Clink has now announced that it will be closing this summer due to ‘a number of factors’, including costs and participant numbers.

Donna-Marie Edmonds, Chief Executive of The Clink Charity, said: “The decision not to renew our contract at HMP Styal has been made with an incredibly heavy heart.

“The Clink Charity’s mission is to reduce re-offending and we have been doing this at Styal, producing outstanding results for over a decade.

“Although the restaurant will officially close this summer, our partnership at Styal will be remembered not only for its landmark training outcomes, but as a beacon of hope, where women have sought refuge and rehabilitation.”

As one of those students put it: “If it wasn’t for my journey at The Clink, I wouldn’t be where I am now.”

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Featured image: The Manc Group

Eats

Deansgate’s new mini brunch triangle attracting big queues – and rightly so

Danny Jones Danny Jones New Manchester brunch spot triangle Deansgate

Manchester is absolutely bursting at the seams with brilliant brunch spots, and don’t even get just started on trying to pick from all 10 boroughs as a whole, it’s impossible.

However, over the past year or so, we suddenly realised that somewhat of a city centre trio of brunch spots serving unreal breakfasts, midday delights and early afternoon scran has emerged.

A new Manc brunch triangle, if you will.

While some have been there longer than others, all three of these places within aren’t just within spitting distance of each other but are enjoying a real wave of success at the moment – and it’s no surprise why: they’re all utterly incredible.

Three brilliant city centre brunch spots for you to try

1. Bruncho

First up on the list is the aptly named Bruncho, which opened just last summer, and despite announcing itself to the Manchester hospitality scene rather quietly at the time, it’s starting to pick up some serious pace now.

Specialising in unreal breakfasts and Mediterranean exports like menemen, Turkish eggs, their own spins of spicy favourite shakshuka, as well as plenty of dessert-forward plates with colour palettes as full as the plates themselves.

It goes without saying that you can obviously get a proper good ‘Bruncho Full English‘, but we’d encourage you to branch out and, who knows, maybe have a brekkie that features ice cream? In fact, it’s sentences like that which make it our Thomas’ favourite way to start the day – albeit ideally a lie-in.

2. Alex’s Bakery

Now, another very strong candidate which has been around on the Manc brunch scene much longer than the other two on this list is local success story, Alex’s Bakery, though we’ll admit we’d mainly visited this place for the unreal brownies, cupcakes and other assorted sweet treats until recently.

However, in addition to the popularity of their lunch deal (a panini, cupcake and drink), they’ve really stepped up their wider brunch offerings of late, going from what was once just a Manchester Artisan Market back in 2014 to branching out into everything good you can put on toast and tonnes more.

It may not garner the often ridiculously long queues of other places, but that’s because this place has a steady flow of regulars all week long who’ve steadily fallen in love with it over many years. They’re tres leches cakes alone are well worth the visit.

3. Acai And The Tribe

Last but not least, the acai craze is undoubtedly one of the biggest foodie trends around right now, as proven by the lines that gather outside this Great Northern venue at least once virtually every weekend – but Acai And The Tribe has actually been on the hype for ages.

That being said, after moving from Arndale Market to Deansgate Mews back in 2022 and now along the main strip in recent months, their popularity has skyrocketed. If you’re looking for a health brunch open packed with vibrance, vitamins and plenty of other very nice toppings, this is the one for you.

We’ll warn you, finding the right window to visit is essentially if you don’t want to wait around for ages these days, but both Clem and Daphne still greatly approve, so it’s it gets the seal of approval from us.

So, while we could recommend you a whole load of fantastic places in around Manchester city centre, we’ve been particularly charmed by this mini Manc brunch triangle around Deansgate.

Best of all, it’s just always great to see local businesses thriving, isn’t it? Especially when it comes to people lining the streets and sending it viral just for a chance to taste their offerings.

Modern breakfast and brunch are things that can be either perfect in their simplicity or surprising in their creativity; either way, we’re glad there are plenty of examples of that here in Manchester.

Trust us, we take this stuff very seriously…

The top 25 places for the best breakfast and brunch in Manchester

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For all the latest news, events and goings on in Greater Manchester, subscribe to The Manc newsletter HERE.

Featured Images — The Manc Group

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