Over in Manchester’s Green Quarter, there is a charming restaurant serving up some of the best pasta in the city.
Called The Sparrows, last week it was revealed as one of the new additions to the prestigious Michelin Guide – a recognition that’s truly well deserved.
Long beloved by Manchester foodies, it takes its name from its signature dish, spätzle: a thick, irregularly-shaped pasta so named because its dough looks like birds in flight when scraped, wet, from the board straight into a boiling pan of water.
One-half of the couple behind the restaurant, Chef Franco Concli, hails from Trentino in the north of Italy where dishes often share influences with neighbouring Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
The other, Kasia Hitchcock, was born in Poland close to the Ukrainian border, where dumplings are a comforting part of the food culture.
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It makes sense, then, that on the menu you’ll find plump handmade pierogi and pelimeni dumplings stuffed with the likes of cottage cheese and potato, mushroom and homemade sauerkraut, listed alongside gnocchi, pappardelle, tortelli, and the pasta that started it all, spätzle.
The kase spätzle is a must-order dish at The Sparrows. / Image: The Manc Eats
The pasta dish from which The Sparrows takes its name. / Image: The Manc Eats
One of the beauties of the menu here, specials aside, is that you pick your own pasta and sauce combination. Sauce options include butter and sage, tomato, guanciale, and bolognese, but the must-order dish, the one I always go back to, is the kase spätzle.
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Essentially a grown-up, Germanic version of mac and cheese, think fresh egg noodles enveloped in creamy gruyere and Emmental cheese sauce, with braised onions adding a touch of sweetness. It’s a Swabian specialty but also very popular in Germany, Switzerland, and now Manchester too.
As for the bar, there is an enticing list of low-intervention Germanic and Polish wines, plus a strong sake menu.
Before The Sparrows, Kasia’s sake company supplied Umezushi. Now sadly closed, it was once Manchester’s best sushi restaurant and a key player in helping the couple get their start up here.
Pierogi dumplings at The Sparrows. / Image: The Manc Eats
Pappardelle with chorizo, cherry tomato, spinach and cream at The Sparrows. / Image: The Manc Eats
Owners had recently converted the archways opposite into prep kitchens, and it was here in 2019 that it all began, with dumplings and spätzle served in a tiny arch that seated twelve at a push.
Needless to say, after a rave from Jay Rayner in The Guardian the restaurant quickly outgrew Mirabel Street and moved to a new, bigger arch no more than five or ten minutes walk away.
As time has gone on, its settings and service have become undeniably sleeker. Its menu, however, has stayed pretty much the same – including its low prices.
On my first ever visit in the summer of 2019, I think my friend and I spent just over £50 on a three course meal with wine. This time, a plate of spätzle is still only £10.50 shared between two of us.
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Given everything that’s going on in the restaurant industry, and the fact that I recently saw a far inferior plate of pasta listed at £16.50 in another Manchester restaurant, it’s a very pleasant surprise.
The daily special, tortelli stuffed with butternut squash with an amaretti biscuit crumb. Image: The Manc Eats
The menu at The Sparrows is still amazingly good value despite its ever-growing prestige. / Image: The Manc Eats
As it ever was, the staples are still there: gnocchi and spätzle, pappardelle and a daily special, available to order with your sauce of choice from just £8 a plate.
We also try one of the specials, starting our meal sweet with tortell stuffed with butternut squash and seasoned with the almond crunch of an amaretti crumb.
Add to that long ribbons of pappardelle with an indulgent mix of chorizo, cherry tomato, spinach and cream, a small plate of fresh and fragrant dill-fermented cucumbers, and an excellent bottle of Teliana Valley orange wine, and suffice to say our table was a very happy one indeed.
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The house pierogi still come stuffed with the same choices of potato and cottage cheese, or sauerkraut and mushroom, and popular sides of salted rosemary focaccia and sauerkraut are correct and present, priced from £3.75.
Even better, dumplings can be ‘mixed and matched’ at the chef’s discretion – a good option if you can’t decideon your order and want to try a bit of everything.
Inside The Sparrows on Red Bank. / Image: The Manc Eats
Dill-fermented cucumbers at The Sparrows. / Image: The Manc Eats
As for the dessert menu, there’s still the sweet spätzle with cinnamon butter and brown sugar, as well as Daz’s wife’s brownie (Daz being their postman), although I regret to report I overindulged so immensely on the savoury portion of the meal I was too far gone to contemplate a pudding.
The restaurant itself is chic and stylish, with statement lighting fixtures and tall glass windows looking into an open kitchen. But the real marvel is what comes out on your plate.
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No doubt it will soon be inundated with new fans, as it should be. Run, don’t walk, whilst you can still get a table. This really is some of the best pasta in town.
Feature image – The Manc Eats
Eats
‘Do not let Britain’s independent businesses disappear on your watch’ – Manchester bakery makes heartbreaking plea to Andy Burnham
Clementine Hall
A beloved Manchester bakery has issued an open letter to Andy Burnham ahead of the Budget begging him for help.
Barbakan Deli in Chorlton is basically an institution at this point.
The legendary bakery and delicatessen has been serving the community for 62 years, famed for its freshly-baked loaves of bread, its handmade sandwiches, and its pastries and cakes inspired by bakes from across Europe.
Posting on Instagram last night on Thursday 18 September, Frankie Dyer the director of Barbakan, issued an open letter addressed to Prime Minister Andy Burnham.
Images: The Manc Group
It read: “Dear Mr Burnham, As an independent business owner in the hospitality sector, I am begging you to please read this.
“Really read it. And seriously consider what businesses like mine are telling you before the upcoming Budget.”
It continued: “In just the last two years, we have self-funded new bakery machinery, new catering kitchens, essential repairs and renovations and opened a second retail site, creating another six local jobs. We have won more than ten national awards for the quality of what we do.
“We have invested. We have grown. We have employed more people. We have worked harder than ever. In short, Prime Minister, we are doing everything you keep asking British businesses to do.
“And our bank balance is finished. That is the reality.”
The letter finished by Dyer inviting Andy Burnham to come visit the bakery and pleading for a ‘fighting chance’ to save the business: “We need action. We need meaningful reductions in the tax burden placed on employers.
“We need Employer National Insurance looked at urgently. We need a business-rates system which allows independent high-street businesses to survive. We need VAT reform for hospitality. We need Corporation Tax to reward businesses which reinvest, employ and grow.
“And we need proper grants and incentives that help established independent businesses invest and expand — not schemes with endless criteria which most ordinary businesses can never access. We need you to do something.
“And we need more than one token gesture in the Budget. A band-aid for a bullet wound. So I am asking you, Prime Minister, to come back to Manchester and see it for yourself. Pop an apron on and stand behind our counter.
Images: The Manc Group
“Come into our bakery in the middle of the night and meet the people making Manchester’s bread while most of the city is asleep. Look at our payroll, our energy bills, our rates, our supplier increases.
“Look at what leaves our bank account every single week simply for the privilege of keeping 50 people employed and our doors open. You said you wanted a government that understood the regions. You now have an opportunity to prove it.
“Independent businesses across this country are not asking for a handout. We are asking for a fighting chance. I sincerely hope your next Budget gives us one”.
Drinks prices revealed as Manchester Airport’s first-ever Wetherspoons pub opens inside T2
Emily Sergeant
It’s official… Manchester Airport’s first-ever JD Wetherspoon pub has officially opened its doors inside Terminal 2.
The 300-seater pub – which welcomed its first customers earlier this week – is named The Belle Vue after Manchester’s historic showground.
Throughout the pub, you’ll spot design features that nod to the city’s sporting heritage – including vintage event posters and memorabilia, a ‘locker wall’ hosting trophies and other sporting exhibits, and a cricket-themed design in the carpets and bar panels.
Creating around 150 jobs in the process, The Belle Vue is the final planned new eatery to open in the airport’s redeveloped Terminal 2, marking one of the final steps in the super-terminal’s decade-long, £1.5bn transformation.
Manchester Airport’s first-ever Wetherspoons pub has opened inside Terminal 2 / Credit: Supplied
According to the MEN, pints are priced from £6.20 for Carling and Coors lager, £6.45 for Budweiser, £6.60 for Guinness, and £6.70 for Poretti and 1664 Biere.
Prosecco is £9.20 for 175ml glass and £37.10 for the full bottle, while spirts and mixers are £6.80 for singles and £10.20 for doubles.
There’s also the classic Wetherspoons tea and coffee machines, where you can refill as many times as you like for just £3.60.
“It’s a proud moment to see the final new retail unit opening in our new-look Terminal 2,” commented Richard Jackson, who is the Retail Director at Manchester Airport.
“To be rounding off this 10-year programme by adding such an iconic name as Wetherspoon to the terminal is particularly special and we know that it will prove extremely popular with passengers. We think they’ll love the nods to Manchester’s heritage in the décor and design – and of course the name.”
Georgina Pellant -
5th February 2023 
