The best bottomless brunches to try in Manchester city centre this weekend
Bottomless Brunch in lockdown may have been a daily occurrence for those at home but now Manchester's restaurant scene has reopened, customers can finally have their avocado and poached eggs on toast with some never-ending drinks!
What beats a bottomless brunch?All the food. All the drink. Slap bang in the middle of the day.
It’s the perfect way to spend a Saturday or Sunday; bonding with pals over grub and booze before slinking off for an afternoon snooze.
More than a few of us might have created our own boozy brunches at home during lockdown, but now Manchester’s restaurant scene has reopened, customers can finally have their avocado and poached eggs on toast with some never-ending drinks.
Here’s a few of our top picks for bottomless brunches being hosted across the city right now.
Fress
Fress is an award-winning white-subway tiled restaurant on Oldham Street that’s earned a stonking reputation for whipping up a seriously good bottomless brunch.
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They have just reopened and are raring to go with a hearty menu featuring all the favourites – including the classic full English and posh beans on toast.
There’s also a mouth-watering selection of waffles and pancakes to alongside that… if you can manage it.
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You can order drinks throughout your 1 hour 15 minute slot and choose from as much Prosecco, Mimosas, House Wine and House Lager as you like for a set cost of £15 extra per person.
You don’t need to book before going to Fress and their bottomless brunch is available 9pm – 4pm, seven days a week.
BLVD – the Spinningfields venue without the vowels and all the flavour – put their own unique spin on the bottomless brunch.
Available at the weekend, these dishes aren’t your traditional breakfast bites.
BLVD small plates include some tangy treats, from vegetable tempura to chicken penang spring rolls. This is ideal for those still wanting the luxury of a bottomless date but with a more sophisticated menu.
You can choose to drink Bloody Mary’s, Bottled Beers, BLVD Gin Cocktail or a Glass of Prosecco in your 90 minute slot and it costs £35pp.
Brickhouse Social opened in March last year on New Wakefield Street, but they’ve only been running their brunches since January this year.
The brunches are a bit special as they are themed and run every Saturday from 12pm – 6pm.
For the rest of July and August, the mood is ’80s style – which applies to the drinks, food and music!
Some of the cocktails inspired by the decade include the ‘Space Raider’ and ‘Purple Rain’, for example.
Later in the year, the restaurant will time travel to the ’90s, flipping the music to Spice Girl mixes with a ‘Wannabe’ or ‘Genie in a Bottle’ cocktail.
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It’s priced at £30 per person and each guest receives a whole pizza of their choice, banging 80s/90s tunes and two hours’ worth of bottomless drinks (including prosecco, wine, and bottled beers)
Foundry Project moved into the Northern Quarter in 2018 and has quickly settled in its surroundings with some suitably superb food offerings.
Their bottomless brunch, in particular, is a real treat.
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Customers can choose any dish from the burger, pizza or salad menu, indulging in unlimited Prosecco, Bellini’s, Mimosas or Bloody Marys for two whole hours.
The cost is £25 per person.
Foundry calls itself the “happiest place in Manchester”; you’ll certainly be feeling good after all that booze and grub at that price.
Shack
Open for walk-ins, the trendy Shack bar serves up some great brunch options designed to be enjoyed with bottomless Bloody Marys, Bellinis, Prosecco or Mimosas for £25 per person.
Their traditional brunch deal is banging, but from Monday they’re set to announce a new spin on their midday meals – including a fresh disco theme.
Gaucho is a cool and classy kinda place. And its electro brunch sees the venue come alive.
The Argentinian restaurant on St Mary’s Street has attracted hundreds of guests for its long-running music-fuelled all-you-can eat midday feast; with bar staff pouring cocktails to the sound of DJs spinning tunes.
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The standard price is £45 each, of your can upgrade to unlimited food and cocktails for an extra tenner.
Choripan sandwiches, smashed avocado and steak & eggs are all on the menu.
Gaucho’s famous brunch runs every Saturday 11am right through to 4pm.
The Manc is supporting Manchester’s independent businesses with the hashtag #buzzingtobeback so if you fancy exploring more of what the city has to offer. Let’s continue supporting local independents to get the region buzzing once more!
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Read more about what we’re doing for the industry here.
Live your Come Dine With Me dreams with this all-new dining concept
Thomas Melia
Across the world, one app has been uniting strangers in 235 cities, matching six lucky diners for an evening meal at a surprise restaurant table and now Manchester is the latest city to open its taste buds to this pseudo-Come Dine With Me concept. Only this one involves less cooking.
Guests are expected to partake in an evening of food, booze and plenty of interesting conversations between six total strangers, only with hopefully less drama than the hit Channel 4 show. Strictly no Jane’s spoiling anything…
The concept is being pushed by French entrepreneur Maxime Barbier and his company ‘TimeLeft’. He has a lengthy career in the nightlife industry behind him and now wants to further strengthen good food and good times via this app.
And it’s clearly working: according to the company’s official website, 96% of dining groups consider themselves compatible meaning their carefully selected pairings are pretty accurate.
All curious diners have to do is download Timeleft and take a personality test before they’re whisked away for a night of entertainment and lush catering picked out by the pioneering new app.
Fear not, there will be a ‘Break the ice’ game where you can get to know the like-minded and compatible strangers you’re spending the rest of the evening with.
Once the table fills up and the evening is well away, everyone round the table will receive a notification to continue the night at a nearby bar chosen once again by this new dining concept app.
This new mealtime experience is a really good way of making connections, especially for newcomers to the city who are looking to expand their friendship group and navigate Manchester with some similar fresh-faced companions. There’s crucially much less cooking involved too, by which we mean none.
Throughout their website, the company shares a range of blogs breaking down everything from ‘6 tips for smoothing over a heated conversation’ to ‘the ultimate guide to Timeleft’.
In a standout piece entitled, ‘The 10 types of strangers at your table‘, they discuss the different types of personalities that you may come across during your meal.
From the simpler and recognisable labels like the introvert and extrovert to the more complex like the contemplative and the humourist, these little excerpts are handy to anyone who may have any nerves ahead of the meeting.
So, anyone located in Greater Manchester who might be interested in this new dining concept can participate by downloading the TimeLeft app and seeing where the night takes them.
You might not go home with £1,000 in cash but you’ll certainly create some memories and come pretty close to living out your Come Dine With Me fantasy – there really is an app for everything.
The stalls causing massive queues at the Manchester Christmas Markets
Daisy Jackson
If you looked at our comment sections during the Manchester Christmas Markets you’d assume everyone hates them – but one look at the queues forming again this year proves that is FAR from the case.
The annual festive event is back with a vengeance for another year, with wooden sheds and pop-up bars all over the place.
Whether you’re after a traditional mulled wine and bratwurst, or a loaded mac and cheese and shimmery cocktail, you’ll find it.
And while the Manchester Christmas Markets always get busy, especially at the weekends, this year is looking especially lively.
Videos shared online show huge queues of gridlocked people on Market Street, in Piccadilly Gardens and on King Street.
The cause of one of the biggest queues is again The Flat Baker – the Ancoats indie debuted at the markets last year with huge croissants served with pots of dipping sauce including pistachio and dulce de leche.
For 2024 they’ve introduced hot chocolates served in an edible cookie cup.
It went viral last year, it’s gone viral again this year, and the queues have gone so wild there’s now actual fences, Disney-style, specifically to manage The Flat Baker crowds.
These wind all the way from their stall in Piccadilly Gardens to the outside of the markets, travelling along the Piccadilly Wall.
And while getting your hands on a Flat Baker croissant requires some grit and determination, it’s not the only spot where you’ll be facing a wait.
Molten dark, milk and even golden chocolate can be bought here in an edible chocolate cup, poured over brownies and strawberries, or used as a base for hot chocolates and affogatos.
The team here move fast but if you go at peak times you’ll still be looking at a queue.
Down on the King Street section of the Manchester Christmas Markets you’ll find Waffle Kart, a brilliant little business serving fun family recipes inspired by Hong Kong street food.
Expect fried chicken and waffles, waffle prawn toast and loaded waffle fries – and a bit of a queue that’s worth the wait.
And finally, the biggest queue of the lot is just Market Street in general.
This is Manchester’s main shopping street so ahead of Christmas it’s always busy, but now that there are stalls all the way down it luring shoppers in, it’s totally gridlocked.