Food & Drink

Peru Perdu unveils ‘adventurous’ festive menu with supercut steaks, champagne and ceviche for Christmas and NYE

Princess Street's glorious South American restaurant is going big for December - serving up a special menu and bumper New Year's Eve party.

The Manc The Manc - 9th December 2021

Manchester’s famous South American resident Peru Perdu is rolling out the red carpet for a bumper programme of interactive dining experiences to celebrate Christmas and New Year.

The Cotton Factory’s wildly-popular, bright-pink Peruvian concept restaurant is hosting a glorious mix of special events for the holidays – ranging from exclusive festive menus and guest dishes to drag brunches and Doggy Christmas Dinners. 

A full month’s worth of dining events come to a head on December 31 – with an action-packed event ringing in 2022.

A spectacular Veuve Clicquot Champagne tower will take centre stage at Peru Perdu on NYE / Image: Peru Perdu

For New Year’s Eve, Peru Perdu is inviting private dining specialists PAMPAS into the Princess Street venue for a decadent night of champagne, supercut steaks and festive-infused dishes with Peruvian and Uruguayan twists – including “the UK’s first ever mince pie empanada”. 

ADVERTISEMENT

PAMPAS’ Bring Me Christmas menu is described as an “adventurous selection of experimental dishes served family style” – featuring wet aged steaks, ceviche with three types of fish, tiger milk fried chicken, and hearty potato pie with black truffle gravy and greens.

Peru Perdu will be dressed to the nines for the occasion – with a spectacular Veuve Clicquot Champagne tower taking centre stage whilst a party soundtrack booms out from the DJ booth. Guests can also pre-order a tall glass of bubbly to enjoy for the New Year’s chimes at midnight.

Spots for the NYE dinner at Peru Perdu cost £85 per person and include a glass of Rochbouet Argentinian sparkling wine on arrival. You can also upgrade and pair a wine with each course for an extra £40pp. 

ADVERTISEMENT

There’s a chance to win four FREE seats at the NYE event (with a glass of Veuve Clicquot from the champagne tower) by entering Peru Perdu’s Instagram competition. Keep your eyes peeled for details over on @peruperdu_mcr. 

Peru Perdu is hosting a dazzling range of festive events this December / Image: Peru Perdu

Peru Perdu has also announced an eclectic mix of interactive dining experiences in the countdown to 2022 – including menu specials, a Veuve Clicquot Festive Drag Brunch, and a furry friends Sunday Christmas dinner.

From Tuesday to Sunday right throughout December, a variety of Christmas feasts will be available – priced £85 per person including paired wines, as well as two-course menus at £30pp and three-course menus for £35pp. 

ADVERTISEMENT

On Saturday 18 December, Peru Perdu will host the intoxicating festive-themed Veuve Clicquot Drag Brunch from midday to 4pm – with a tasty two-course set menu and a glass of Veuve Clicquot on arrival (£35pp). 

Doggy Christmas Dinner events invite guests to bring along their pets / Image: Peru Perdu

The venue will be open to pet pooches every Sunday before NYE – with Doggy Christmas Dinner events inviting guests to bring along their furry friends to tuck into meals alongside them. Whilst owners enjoy a South American inspired roast, pooches can get stuck into a complimentary dog Sunday roast and bone gravy (available when two or more guests are dining). The Doggy Christmas Dinner on December 19 will be a particularly special occasion, as Peru Perdu hosts the ‘Best Dressed Christmas Pooch’ competition – with the three smartest dogs winning free meals for their owners! 

It’s all happening down on Princess Street this month… 

To get yourself booked in for NYE or any December event at Peru Perdu, email [email protected], call 0161 549 0005 or use the website contact form. 

Stay-up-to-date with menus, announcements and competitions by following @peruperdu_mcr on social media. 

ADVERTISEMENT

Read more about what’s happening in Manchester’s food and drinks sector here. 

Featured image: Peru Perdu

Food & Drink

This Manchester food hall is selling ice cream made from the world’s stinkiest fruit

Georgina Pellant Georgina Pellant

A Manchester food hall is serving up a new ice cream flavour that it claims is the stinkiest in the world.

For those unfamiliar with durian, it’s essentially the marmite of the fruit world. Famous for having a truly terrible smell that’s been unfavourably compared to cat p*ss, it’s so pungent that it’s actually been made illegal to eat it on the subway in Singapore.

No such restrictions apply here in Manchester, though, where Hello Oriental, the new(ish) three-storey Asian street food hall on Oxford Road, is causing something of a stir with its stinky but delicious new addition to its soft serve menu.

Served in cute little bear and taiyaki fish-shaped cones, typical flavours on offer through the week here include ube (purple yam), pandan leaf, charcoal, mango and vanilla.

Credit: The Manc Group
The durian soft serve Credit: Supplied

But now, alongside those brightly-coloured, exotic soft serve flavours you’ll also find something a little bit more controversial. Durian soft serve.

Whilst no one seems to disagree on the terrible stench, when it comes to how the fruit actually tastes there are a mixture of comparisons.

Managing to be sweet, creamy and savoury all at once, some say it tastes like “diced garlic and caramel poured into whipped cream”.

The new supermarket at Hello Oriental. Credit: The Manc Group

Others have referred to “subtle hints of chives mixed with powdered sugar”.

Described by Hello Oriental as “one of the most addictive flavours to ever cross your tastebuds”, it’s safe to say that South Asia’s durian fruit ‘isn’t for everyone’ but, if you can get past its uniquely ferocious pong, you are in for a deliciously wild ride.

Available from Hello Oriental on weekends only, the durian batch of soft serve is specially prepared by the team fresh on Saturday and Sunday mornings and available to enjoy from 1pm.

Read more: Manchester’s tiniest tapas bar has found a new home in the Northern Quarter

Located just off Oxford Road, around the corner from Hatch, Hello Oriental offers uncensored
East Asian street food across three storeys.

Comprising a restaurant, bar, cafe, events space and fully stocked supermarket, it recently received a rave review in the Times, with Marina O’Loughlin calling it a “northern powerhouse of Asian street food”.

Featured image – The Manc Eats

Food & Drink

Manchester restaurant famed for ‘inflexible’ tasting menu completely flips the script

Georgina Pellant Georgina Pellant

Since its arrival in Manchester, Michelin-recommended new wave Thai BBQ favourite District has staked its reputation on two things: fantastically surreal, delicious food and an extremely inflexible tasting menu.

Until recently its diners have had two choices, opt for the ten-course tasting menu or spring for the twelve, and whilst everyone I’ve ever known to go has swooned in delight over the whole experience, there’s no denying it hardly makes for a cheap night out (or an easily organised one).

Deposits have always been required up front, and adaptions have famously never been made for a customer’s dislikes, or even religious needs. It’s for this reason, and this reason alone, that until last week I’d never made it over – despite wanting desperately to go.

Simply put, I’d just struggled to find anyone prepared to give up a whole evening (and a shed load of cash) to come with me. Amazing, I know, but thankfully, that’s all now changed.

Image: The Manc Eats
Image: The Manc Eats

Read more: Chefs refusing to cater for dietary issues listed as hospitality trend for 2022

Last year, the kitchen made headlines after getting embroiled in a ‘religious diet’ row with a Jewish customer who’d taken umbrage with its refund policy.

The whole affair culminated with District posting the entire altercation to its social media pages, alongside a caption stating it ‘will not be bullied or threatened into returning deposits’.

During the row, the customer had asked, “why not shout loud on your homepage ‘We don’t cater for Jews’”. Still, they held firm.

A year on and it seems that external pressures may have caused that iron will to buckle, because for the first time ever the Michelin-acclaimed restaurant has moved to offer dishes individually.

Image: The Manc Eats
Image: The Manc Eats

In a complete change of direction, diners can now pop in off the cuff to enjoy a few plates and a couple of drinks. Personally, I think it’s the best news ever, but then I would. It’ll be much easier to get my friends in now.

Suddenly one of the best restaurants in the city has become so much more accessible, and its timing couldn’t be better. After all, we’re all getting poorer, and whilst not everyone has £100 to spend on dinner, everyone deserves a taste of the magic happening in the kitchen here.

Whilst the restaurant maintains that diners can either curate their own District experience or simply pop in for a few dishes, on our visit it is very much a small plate, tapas-style service, with everything appearing on the table in front of us in quick succession.

Read more: Manchester’s tiniest tapas bar has found a new home in the Northern Quarter

Translucent stone bass (£9) floats alien-like in its dish with crispy purple yam antennae suspended above a shimmering nam jim, whilst a pinky-purple pigeon satay (£9) is rich and gamey, dressed with sweetcorn, pumpkin seeds and crisped turnip all unfolding on the plate like a flower in bloom.

Every dish here is a surprise, ranging from a beautifully fresh salad of peach, pear, ginger and shrimp floss, to chicken fat rice, which comes showered in a generous helping of crumbed crispy skin.

Image: The Manc Eats
Image: The Manc Eats

That rule extends into the desserts too. Homemade ‘tangfastic’ tamarind and chicken fat fudge sweets appear, suspended, on their own white marble platform like some sort of futuristic offering.

Elsewhere, a calamansi curd pavlova with sheeps yoghurt and passion fruit reinvents any preconceived notions I might have had about Thai food – or pavlova for that matter.

As Marina O’Loughiling wrote in her review of District for The Times last year, this is “Thai, but not as we know it”.

Read more: Chefs refusing to cater for dietary issues listed as hospitality trend for 2022

Speaking on the change of direction for the restaurant, owner Ben Humphries said: “We are passionate about creating the highest quality experience for our customers.

ADVERTISEMENT

“Our aim is to capture the essence of Thai flavours whilst maintaining the highest quality produce, suppliers and dishes.

“Changing our service style will give us creative freedom in the kitchen. We can develop dishes that don’t have to fit into a tasting menu format. We will also have the opportunity to offer daily changing special dishes.”

The new menu is available now with bookings being taken under ‘New Wave Thai’ on District’s bookings page here.

Feature image – The Manc Eats

More Food & Drink

City Centre

Zumuku Sushi, Ply pizza and ‘native beef’ steakhouse Tallow to open at New Century food hall

City Centre

Manchester’s tiniest tapas bar has found a new home in the Northern Quarter

City Centre

Rozafa: the family-run Greek Cypriot restaurant that’s been a fixture for 15+ years

Audio

Clint Boon takes us around Manchester's iconic Deaf Institute

Eats

We go meatballs deep with Mira's traditional Neapolitan sandwiches