Eats

The Manchester mental health cafe staying open to provide lockdown support

“Feel Good Club exists to remind people that we are all just humans".

Emily Sergeant Emily Sergeant - 3rd November 2020
Instagram – @wearefeelgoodclub

Feel Good Club is Manchester’s new kid on the block and it will be remaining open throughout the second national lockdown for takeaway services and to provide support.

The movement – which started humbly as an Instagram page by founders Kiera and Aimie Lawlor-Skillen – is aimed at normalising the stigma around mental health and has flourished into a successful platform of 120K+ followers.

So successful in fact that is saw the pair go on to open the doors to their brand-new wellbeing-focused coffee house in the heart of the Northern Quarter just last weekend.

But, despite the country heading into another national lockdown – which is expected to take effect from 0.01 GMT on Thursday 5th November and requires hospitality businesses to close for the four week duration – Kiera and Aimie will be keeping the Hilton Street coffee house open for takeaway only.

As well as being a brilliant independent business to grab your caffeine fix from, it will also provide vital support services for those who need most, especially as Google search data compiled by Feel Good Club shows the increasingly-worrying rise in mental health searches, with a 25% uplift in the UK overall.

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Searches for how to deal with anxiety are also up by 53%, how to cope with OCD up 89%, and searches for tips on how to cope with depression are up 67% too.

Instagram – @wearefeelgoodclub

Making the announcement on Instagram, Kiera and Aimie said: “We’ll be staying open throughout lockdown for takeaway [and] our team are mental health first aid trained so can support people who may be in need when they come to get their coffee,”

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“It’s a difficult time for everyone and we want to offer support to anyone who might be struggling during this time.”

“Feel Good Club exists to remind people that we are all just humans”.

The cafe also employs a number of community-driven initiatives such as the ‘pay it forward’, which means you can pay for someone else to have a coffee on you, or easily enjoy one of their pay it forward coffees if you are in need, struggling or having a hard time.

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To make ordering as comfortable as possible, you can send @wearefeelgoodclub a message on Instagram before you order, or ask for a ‘Thumbs Up’ on arrival, and the staff will know exactly what you mean.

Feel Good Club will continue to be a space to host community events, a co-working space, and a place to relax once restrictions are lifted too, and you can find more information via the website here.

You can follow the movement on Instagram here.

Eats

An award-winning pie and mash cafe is opening in Manchester

Georgina Pellant Georgina Pellant

This month award-winning piemakers Great North Pie Co will officially open in Manchester city centre, bringing its high-quality goodies to Kampus for the very first time.

Serving up a modern take on traditional pie and mash dinners, a new, seasonal menu features four butter-pastry pies, stuffed to the brim using only the best ingredients from North West producers.

From 14-hour braised beef and ale pies, to roast chicken and mushroom and the company’s hero classic Lancashire cheese and onion, pie fans can expect to find classic flavour combinations done well at the cosy and intimate new space.

Each pie on the menu is served with a wide range of sides, with choices including buttery mash or proper home-style chips, cauliflower cheese, pickled red cabbage, mushy garden peas or chip shop mushy peas all served with roast onion and brown sauce gravy or the house curry sauce- the ultimate feed.

There will also be weekly comfort food specials such as lamb and pea steamed suet puddings, corned beef hash, Lancashire Hot Pot, and keema and chips.

Image: Great North Pie Co
Image: Great North Pie Co

To round off the perfect meal, puddings include school dinner-style sweet treats like chocolate sponge and custard and the classic sticky toffee pudding. 

Breakfast sandwiches will be served daily between 10:30am and 2.30pm and will feature quality versions of all the breakfast classics including Cheshire Smokehouse honey-cured bacon and Stornoway black pudding.

The drinks menu, meanwhile, includes the likes of Manchester Union Lager on draught, a selection of quality wines and proseccos, plus a handful of spritz style cocktails.

Read more: All the February Manchester restaurant deals, discounts and offers you need in 2023

With booth-style seating for 20 inside and an outdoor area seating area for up to 30 more overlooking the Kampus garden and canal, the cosy new pie cafe is the first resident to arrive on the cobbles of Kampus’s Little David Street.

Neil Broomfield, co-founder of Great North Pie Co, said: “Since we started making pies it’s always been an ambition to have a base in the city centre.

“We’d been looking for a while and as soon as we saw Kampus, Little David Street and the gardens, we knew it was the right place for us. While it’s our first city centre venue, we don’t have plans  to rollout out any more, as we place our focus on keeping the quality and consistency we aim for.

Image: Great North Pie Co
Image: Great North Pie Co

“We just want to concentrate on doing one thing and doing it well. The mix of traders coming into Kampus is amazing and we’re so proud to be part of it.”

Read more: Huge waterside food hall to breathe life into old Manchester warehouse

Great North Pie Co also has venues in Lake District’s Ambleside and in Altrincham Market.  Its products can also be found at monthly farmers markets, where they started the business, in locations such as Urmston, Knutsford, Northwich, Altrincham, Chester, Wilmslow, Chorlton, Bakewell, Macclesfield and West Didsbury.

The pie brand supplies pubs and restaurants nationwide and also supplies to the likes of Booths, Robinsons’s brewery, Dukeshill Hams, Manchester City Football Club, Stockport County FC, and other popular pubs and restaurants across the country.

Read more: A new Deep South-inspired dive bar is coming to Manchester’s Northern Quarter

Its new cafe will officially open its kitchen & bar at Kampus on Monday, 27 February, with its handcrafted pies available to take away cold as well as eat in.

Feature image – Great North Pie

Eats

Huge waterside food hall to breathe life into old Manchester warehouse

Georgina Pellant Georgina Pellant

A new waterside food hall is tipped to open in Manchester as the Allied London team set their sites on a former warehouse on the banks of the river Irwell.

Sitting on the cusp of Spinningfields and Salford, Shipyard, as it will be known, will take inspiration from popular existing concepts such as Manchester’s Mackie Mayor, Lisbon’s Time Out Market, and the Kyiv Food Market.

Located on the corner of Water Street and New Quay Street, according to plans submitted to Manchester City Council it will move into a long-empty warehouse formerly known as Albert Shed.

Due to open in the same part of town as the hotly-anticipated new venue Factory International, after sitting empty for years it’s hoped that the new project will breathe some new life back into the area.

Promising to bring a mix of artisan vendors and ‘rolling smaller stalls’, the new food hall plans to create a new riverside dining destination in the Manchester neighbourhood of St. Johns.

Developers want to transform the existing first floor car park of the building into a food hall, then add a second mezzanine level to provide more seating.

Image: Albert’s Shed / Allied London

A statement to planners said: “We have been working alongside Allied London on the Shipyard (formerly Albert Sheds) to create a new riverside dining destination within the prime location in St. John’s Masterplan.

“Being one of the few original industrial buildings left within the city centre, its high ceilings and waterfront location will provide the perfect atmosphere from day to night.

Read more: Aldi launches new ‘magic bags’ with £10 worth of food for just £3.30

“Our proposals are to repurpose the former warehouse into an eclectic and curated destination that compliments the wider St. Johns Masterplan, by encouraging a mix of artisan vendors and rolling smaller stalls.”

“It is envisaged that the food hall will become more visible during dusk and evening time as the interior is illuminated,” the documents added. “The form of the timber canopy will provide solar shading from morning sun whilst at night the internal space will illuminate the river side.”

Feature image – Alberts Shed / Allied London

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