The Uk’s largest Italian food festival is coming back to Manchester’s Cathedral Gardens for its sixth year in the city, it has been confirmed.
The free-to-attend Festa Italiana will return to Manchester city centre on the August bank holiday weekend, with its main festival hub located at Cathedral Gardens opposite Victoria train station.
Taking place from 25 to 27 August 2023, the weekend will champion the very best in authentic Italian food, drink, music, and performance, with a host of different street food traders, an artisan market village, chef-led cooking demonstrations and loads more coming down for the weekend.
Promising a varied programme for 2023, this year’s festival will feature workshops, demonstrations, signings and banquets from celebrity chefs and award-winning authors as it continues to evolve.
Image: Festa Italiana
Image: Festa Italiana
A passion project dreamt up by Salvi’s owner Maurizio Cecco with the intention of bringing the Italian community of Manchester together as one, Festa Italiana takes in the very best in authentic food, drink, music, and performance.
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The Festa is steeped in tradition, drawing massive inspiration from the incredible festivals in Italy, but also slinging a whole lotta Manc charm into the mix to create a cultural concoction that sets it apart from any other event of its type, anywhere in the world.
The Salvi’s team will be joined at the Festa by some of Manchester’s best Italian street-food vendors and restaurateurs, as well as live musicians and performers on party supply duties.
Chefs confirmed to appear at the festival so far include Gennaro Contaldo, UK brand ambassador for Parmigiano Reggiano, (Saturday Kitchen, Two Greedy Italians, Jamie and Jimmy’s Friday Night Feast), Giancarlo Caldesi (Return to Tuscany, Saturday Kitchen, Sunday Brunch), Great British Bake Off 2021 winner Giuseppe Dell’Anno, Masterchef UK 2021 quarter-finalist and ICG Cooking Competition Award winner Sofia Gallo, and Salvi’s owner Maurizio Cecco.
The festival will also introduce a new element this year, as it welcomes Birrificio Angelo Poretti to Manchester to host the ‘ultimate ticketed dining experience’ at its Poretti Grande Tavola.
Festival goers can pull up a chair and enjoy classic Italian food from Salvi’s and enjoy an authentic Italian lager from Poretti’s Piazza.
Poretti will also have its own dining area at this year’s Festa Italiana where guests can enjoy a delicious sit-down meal with a menu that has been curated to pair perfectly with Poretti.
With more details set to be announced closer to the time, for now, if you’d like to find out more about Manchester’s Festa Italian visit its website here.
Featured image – Festa Italiana
Eats
Popular Manchester restaurant bar to give out FREE sausage rolls to people called ‘Greg’
Emily Sergeant
One of Manchester’s much-loved restaurant bars is doing a free sausage roll giveaway next week… but there’s a catch.
The catch being you have to have a certain name in particular.
It was only last week that popular high street chain Pret A Manger announced it would be slinging out free sandwiches to any Mancs with ‘Nic’ in their name over the late May bank holiday weekend, and now Tariff & Dale is getting it on the giveaway action, and it’s all to celebrate the iconic event that is National Sausage Roll Day.
In case you didn’t know – which is very likely, let’s be real – next Thursday (5 June) is the day dedicated to all things sausage roll.
So what better way to mark the occasion than with free portions of Tariff & Dale‘s legendary meaty treat?
The popular Northern Quarter restaurant bar is known for its creative comfort food, craft beers and cocktails, and laid-back industrial vibe, with one of the cult-classic dishes on its menu having always been the honey pork sausage roll – which just so happens to be a whopping 15-inches long, by the way.
Resembling something more of a pork wellington than a sausage roll, if you will, the dish is crispy, golden, and glazed with honey on top.
But to celebrate National Sausage Roll day, instead of parting with £9.50 for a portion or £48 for the full 15-inch thing, people with one specific name can actually get a slice for completely free of charge.
Tariff & Dale is giving away FREE sausage rolls to people with this name next week / Credit: Supplied
And that name is ‘Greg’, because if we’re honest, when it comes to sausage rolls, we all tend to think of Greggs.
So whether your surname is Gregory or Gregson, or you’re simply just called Greg, then all you need to do to claim your complimentary slice of sausage roll heaven is head on down to Tariff & Dale next Thursday 5 June from 12pm up until 9pm.
Make sure you show your valid ID proving your name when you order at the bar, and get ready to stuff your face.
Failing that, anyone not called Greg will just have to pop into actual Greggs instead.
Featured Image – Wikimedia Commons
Eats
Plans to open a brand-new pub on the site of the Rovers Return
Daisy Jackson
A brand-new pub is set to open in Manchester city centre net month, with treats in store like complimentary bowls of crisps, an outdoor terrace, and a games parlour.
The Stables Tavern is taking shape in the St John’s district, poetically on the same site that was once home to Coronation Street’s iconic Rovers Return pub.
They’re promising this will be a ‘historic tavern reimagined for today’s lover of a proper pint’.
The pub will come from Shiko Group, which is also behind Courts Club, where you can play tennis or basketball followed by court-side pints, and Side Street, a bar-restaurant-events space with a mid-Century interior.
Neighbouring the Bonded Warehouse, The Stables Tavern will join this rapidly blossoming new creative district, just across the yard from Caravan, The Trading Route and Aviva Studios.
Inside, punters will find multiple beer taps with local beers, served with complimentary bowls of crisps as well as a menu of pub snacks like handmade sausage rolls and local pies.
The pub will be split into three sections – an outside terrace, a main bar, and a parlour area at the back of the pub for live entertainment, old school games, and rounds of whiskey.
This might be a new district but it’s a historic area for the city – the same building was a busy watering hole back in the early 19th century for workers, merchants and visitors who made use of the nearby canals and cobbled streets.
It was then the home of the Rovers Return, back when this area was the home of Granada Studios.
Hayley Sammé, Marketing Director, said: “We’re so excited to bring The Stables Tavern back to St John’s. The area’s extensive historical backdrop and burgeoning hospitality scene provides the perfect landscape for a traditional British pub.
“It’s the perfect addition to the existing scene, and we hope it’s going to become a popular spot in our new creative district.”
The Stables Tavern will open at St John’s on Friday 6 June.
Georgina Pellant -
16th May 2023 
