One of TV’s most recognisable chefs, Gino D’Acampo, has revealed plans to open a new ‘premium’ Italian restaurant in Manchester.
The chef will be staying in the same spot where his team currently operate the First Street Bar & Kitchen brand, but giving it an £800k refurbishment and rebrand.
The restaurant, at the Innside by Melia Manchester hotel, will soon operate under the name ‘Gino D’Acampo’.
The opening of Gino D’Acampo follows success for the same restaurant brand in Newcastle, Liverpool, London and Leeds, with three further UK sites planned for 2024.
He’s promising that the space will be chic and contemporary with ‘Gino’s signature feature wallpaper’ plus marble table tops, brass finishes, and space for 200 diners across the open-plan restaurant and bar.
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The restaurant’s transformation into Gino D’Acampo will include a new bar area with an island cocktail bar, and its own entrance and reception area, with a two-tier terrace.
It’s located in the First Street area, also home to HOME, Junkyard Golf, Bunny Jackson’s and the Gasworks Brew Bar.
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Phase two of the site’s makeover will see the 80-seat alfresco drinking and dining area turned into an all-weather terrace.
Dishes on the menu will include classic Italian plates and expert cocktails, with Italian wines and artisan beers.
Gino D’Acampo LiverpoolInside the Leeds branch of Gino D’Acampo as chef announces new Manchester restaurantFood at Gino D’Acampo in LeedsFood at Gino D’Acampo in Leeds
Speaking on the announcement, Gino D’Acampo said: “I couldn’t be more pleased to announce plans for Gino D’Acampo at INNSiDE Manchester.
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“I have a long relationship with the city having opened one of my first restaurants here almost ten years ago and I’m delighted to return to the heart of Manchester, as planned.
“It has always been our intention to open a Gino here, at the beautiful INNSiDE Manchester hotel, and I’m looking forward to launching this early next year.
“The First Street area combines all that I love about Manchester – ease of reach to cool music venues, art, and culture. As an Italian with a love for alfresco dining, I’m looking forward to enjoying a real Neapolitan pizza and negroni (or two) on the terrace this summer. I hope to see you there.”
Garry Fortune, UK Director of Operations at Meliá Hotels International, added: “Gino and his team are a trusted and much respected partner with a proven track record for delivering on performance. We are thrilled to continue our work together with the opening of Gino D’Acampo Manchester, our third collaboration in the North.”
New Manchester restaurant receives rave review as another is slammed as ‘torture’
Daisy Jackson
Pip, a new restaurant in Manchester, has received a rave national review this week – a review which slammed another restaurant in the same feature.
Food critic William Sitwell wrote in his review in The Telegraph that Pip is charming, refined, and fabulous.
“Bravo, Pip. Pip pip!” he wrote in the glowing write-up on the new restaurant, which stands at the foot of the new Treehouse Hotel and has the acclaimed Mary-Ellen McTague at its helm.
Sitwell’s Telegraph review particularly raved about dishes including Lancashire hot pot (‘fabulously good’), a wild garlic soup (‘a gorgeous thing’), and an apple trifle (‘a gift from heaven’).
But while it was all good for Pip, there were significantly less positive adjectives heaped on another restaurant in Manchester.
In fact, he said that Pip is ‘a great-value tonic’ for the ‘brash (and pricey) torture’ across town.
That restaurant was KAJI, formerly known as MUSU, which he said was ‘all tummies, bald heads, tattoos and heat’.
Sitwell said that while the service and sashimi are good at KAJI, the ‘place is afflicted by some overbearing cooking that cheapens the noble name of Japanese cuisine’.
He wrote: “Lamb chops fail the tender test and are properly wrecked sitting on a vulgar pond of sticky “tomato ponzu”. No beast should die to have that stuff squirted anywhere near it.
“And Kaji is a Japanese gaff without sake. Which is like opening a British pub in Tokyo and forgetting to put an ale on tap.”
Sharing the review, Pip wrote: “Thankyou @telegraph and @williamsitwell for the fantastic feature. We’re so proud of our team here.”
Milk Maids, Bolton – The family-run ice cream parlour on an award-winning farm
Daisy Jackson
Ice cream doesn’t come much fresher than those served at Milk Maids – in fact, you’ll be standing right on the family farm where the cows that produce the milk live, as you tuck into your scoop.
This unassuming dairy farm in Bolton has been in operation for decades, and in the same family for generations.
But it’s when sisters Fiona and Rebecca saw the full potential of all that award-winning milk being produced on their farm that Milk Maids was born.
This ice cream parlour on Dearden’s Farm in Over Hulton is now one of the hottest spots in Greater Manchester, especially when the weather is similarly hot.
Every month they release a whole batch of flavours, all made fresh daily (you can literally see Fiona legging it across the yard with buckets of milk to make fresh batches), with May specials including white chocolate and sea salt caramel, raspberry cookie, and passionfruit pavlova.
Milk Maids, Bolton – The family-run ice cream parlour on an award-winning farm
Cones can be filled with molten chocolate or pistachio creme before your ice cream is scooped and pressed into the cone.
Or you can have your chosen flavour whizzed up into a milkshake, served in a milk bun, or presented in an insulated take-home box for later.
We could wax lyrical about how good this ice cream is, but the queues really do speak for themselves, and you should go and get in it right now.
Daisy Jackson -
21st December 2023 
