News

Manchester International Festival reveals lineup for Festival Square

This year, Festival Square will move to Cathedral Gardens

Georgina Pellant Georgina Pellant - 4th May 2021

The food, drink and music lineup for the Manchester International Festival (MIF) Festival Square 2021 has officially been revealed.

Moving into the square’s outdoor kitchens this year will be pizzaiolos Honest Crust, a new vegan offering Stellar and a selection of traders from Mary Ellen McTague’s Eat Well MCR.

Heathcote&Co will also be in attendance serving up a selection of affogatos, ice cream floats and speciality coffees.

New venture Stellar by Dan Hope (of Firebird Hope and Pepperoni Playboy) will see the plant-based chef slinging out barbacoa sandos, falafel burgers and, of course, his legendary homemade seitan ‘fried chicken’ burgers.

Firebird Hope

Meanwhile, Mary Ellen McTague’s social enterprise Eat Well MCR Marketplace – formed in the first lockdown to turn food waste into healthy meals for the vulnerable – will be well represented at the square with a slew of daily specials from the collective’s members.

ADVERTISEMENT

Local Eat Well traders and chefs such as ISCA and The Refuge will look to create limited edition specials for ‘build your own’ picnic boxes – with all profits going back into the initiative’s community support work.

Eat Well MCR favourites Chorlton Cheese Shop, Beehive, Holy Grain, Plucky Pickle and Acorn Dairy are all expected to make an appearance.

ADVERTISEMENT

McTague is no stranger to MIF, having hosted an Alice in Wonderland-themed dinner in 2019.

MIF

Speaking on the new collaboration, McTague said: “Manchester International Festival is the perfect platform to showcase our wonderful marketplace of suppliers – the chefs and restaurants in our amazing collective – so we can tell our story to the wider community, all whilst raising much-needed funds to continue our support work.”

The festival hub will move to Cathedral Gardens for 2021 due to ongoing renovations at the Town Hall.

ADVERTISEMENT

On the music front, a busy programme will be split across three stages – with different nights curated by the likes of Homoelectric, Dave Haslam, DJ Paulette, Jamz Supernova, Mr Scruff and BBC Music Introducing.

Performances by emerging talents, meanwhile, have been curated through MIF Sounds.

Formed to encourage creatives to keep going through last year’s turbulent events, it will see DJ collective All Hands On Deck, Swing Ting label boss Balraj Samrai and singer One Da all take over the square at different points.

Manchester International Festival 2021 runs from July 1 – 18, with tickets available from May 20.

News

Beloved plant-based independent street food business Herbivorous is set to close imminently

Danny Jones Danny Jones Herbivorous shutting down Manchester Sheffield York

We hate writing this, but we have news of yet another local hospitality closure as beloved Manchester-born and pioneering plant-based brand Herbivorous has confirmed they’ll soon be calling it a day.

If you can hear us sighing through the screen, apologies – we’re just getting really fed up of saying farewell to our favourites, so god knows how rubbish those involved feel.

This comes in the same week that fellow animal-free food vendors and Manc icons Desert Island Dumplings announced they will also be saying goodbye in a matter of months.

Unfortunately, in the case of Herbivorous, we’ve got mere weeks before their sites across the North shut for good. Just gutting.

As you can see, the team behind the multi-location vegan street food specialists began by writing: “It’s a long one so stay with me… It seems you can’t open social media at the moment without reading about another hospitality business closing down.

“Throughout 8 years of Herbivorous years we’ve come up against many challenges from Covid 5 years ago to watching all the big vegan brands from London and beyond come to Manchester and largely disappear again to the closure of Hatch our busiest site, but with continually increasing costs its becoming really difficult to maintain a thriving business.”

Herbivorous started out life back in 2016 as a cult hit at the old outdoor food, drink and entertainment hub centring around a ‘container village’, the first of its kind in the city and soon to reopen under new owners and a new name.

Since then, co-founders Robyn and Damian have gone on to expand not just to one permanent site over in Withington but with outposts in Sheffield and York, having gained a strong reputation with stalls and pop-ups all over.

Their hospitality story might not have the ending we personally would hope for, but it’s been a brilliant one for so many foodie fans – us lot included.

Nevertheless, they go on to add in the emotional statement that external pressures such as a recent bereavement and their own ever-growing family have also contributed to the decision which, despite being an understandably hard one, “feel like the right time.”

“We are so incredibly proud of how far we’ve come from spending long days slinging duck wraps from our green vintage horse box at festivals to three Herbi locations across the North of England”, they continue, “and with that we’ve also met so many fantastic people!”

“Whether you worked for us at a few festivals over [the] summer or for years at our restaurant, we just wanted to say and massive thank you! The memories will stay with us forever and, of course, how can we not mention our fabulous customers!

“Thank you all so much for choosing Herbivorous over the years. Those of you who had our food at Festivals and then found us at one of our permanent locations, those of you who came back week after week to Hatch, Spark, Withington and beyond.”

Read more:

They signed off by detailing their final business days, with their Sheffield Kommune spot having already shut for refurbishment; meanwhile, their spot in SPARK York will be wrapping up on Saturday, 19 April.

As for their flagship brick-and-mortar venue here in Greater Manchester, Herbivorous Withington will be shutting on Friday, 25 April.

Once again, there’s nothing we can say other than thank you for years of delicious food, that we’re guttted to see you go, and that everyone at The Manc Group wishes you the best whatever comes next.

For all the latest news, events and goings on in Greater Manchester, subscribe to The Manc newsletter HERE.

Featured Images — The Manc Eats

News

AJ Tracey is playing a VERY intimate gig in Manchester next month

Thomas Melia Thomas Melia

London rapper and respected grime artist AJ Tracey is ‘live and direct’ once again, announcing a whole host of UK dates, one of which is a rather intimate gig right here in Manchester.

It’s official: one of UK rap’s leading gents is getting back on the road and he’s showing a ‘Little More Love’ to lots of cities, including Manchester.

In a post on the UK star’s socials, AJ Tracey trades his music persona for that of a sports pundit as he announces the dates for his upcoming tour while impersonating an F1 commentator.  

Anyone looking to attend Tracey’s ‘Not Even A Tour’ can catch the star up and down the country on his over 20-date tour with a stop in Manchester as soon as this month.

The rapper has reached phenomenal heights since dropping the unforgettable ‘Ladbroke Grove’ in 2019 and is heading out across the nation to make sure everyone knows about it.

Get ready to spit bars left and right as this rapper’s discography is stacked with serious tunes like ‘Dinner Guest’, ‘West Ten’, ‘Thiago Silva’ and more.

More recently, he collaborated with Walsall’s finest Jorja Smith for a flirty garage beat also known as ‘Crush’ with the video being the two artists talking it out in a good old fashioned caff.

The latest collaboration with Smith marks the start of a new era for Mr. Live and direct as it fell in line with the announcement of his third studio album.

Titled Don’t Die Before You’re Dead, we’re sure he’ll be “building a vibe” wherever he goes and probably previewing a few exclusive tracks from his upcoming project too.

Wait until you hear where he’s playing too…

AJ Tracey is playing a VERY intitmate gig in Manchester this month.
Credit: @AJTracey on Instagram

This gig may come as quite a surprise for any hardcore fans of the ‘Ladbroke Grove’ star as the venue in which he’s performing is definitely intimate only, holding just over 250 guests.

This rap giant is bringing his unbelievable beats to none other than the legendary small-cap city centre live music venue, The Deaf Institute, at the end of this month.

It’s safe to say you won’t get many more chances, if any, to see him in such a tight-knit space again.

AJ Tracey is bringing ‘Not Even A Tour’ to Deaf Institute in Manchester on 30 April, with tickets on sale Friday 4 April from 12 noon.

You can get ready to grab yours HERE.

Read more:

For all the latest news, events and goings on in Greater Manchester, subscribe to The Manc newsletter HERE.

Featured Images — John Lubbock (via Wikimedia Commons)/Audio North

More News

Save Our Baby Bank Trafford Greater Manchester fundraiser

Business

A local baby bank is holding a vital fundraiser to stop it from closing for good

Business

Government to begin giving millions of UK workers ‘significant’ pay rises from this week

Laura Stanley

Crime

Body of woman found in River Mersey last year finally identified after ‘extensive’ investigation

Audio

Clint Boon takes us around Manchester's iconic Deaf Institute

Eats

We go meatballs deep with Mira's traditional Neapolitan sandwiches