Many of us have returned to our ordinary work routines now, meaning we’re having to adapt to some unfamiliarly early starts.
We rely on coffee to carry us through the morning commute at the crack of dawn, but now life is slowly returning to “normal”, there’s no time to create those Instagram-worthy iced coffees that kept you ticking over during long days in lockdown.
Thankfully, there are several coffee companies that provide delicious ice-cold coffee to sip on-the-go – offering you the perfect way to kickstart your morning in the hot weather.
Here’s a few that come highly recommended…
Jimmy’s
https://www.instagram.com/p/B9oJHuxFAYP/
A classic iced coffee company is Jimmy’s: An independent, family-owned brand with an awesome range of ready-to-drink iced coffees who are proud to use only ethically sourced ingredients, Rainforest Alliance Certified Arabica coffee and 100% recyclable packaging.
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Jimmy’s boast a huge range of drinks, from canned double shot flat whites to their classic original blend cartoned ice coffee. For the dairy free and vegans amongst us, there’s also a new oat flat white which has an aromatic vanilla flavour whilst still packing in a caffeine boost!
There’s even sparkling soda in a glass bottle, Jimmy’s Coffee Cola, which can substitute as a different kind of an early morning pick-up.
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Jimmy’s iced coffees are extremely accessible and affordable, stocked in most large supermarkets and available online.
Bottleshot Brew
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Fresh, female-led and feisty, Bottleshot Brew is the brand to support if you want to taste authentic, New Orleans-inspired cold brew coffee in a can.
A premium, ethically-minded company committed to producing high-quality alternative to hot coffee, Bottleshot put each can through an 18-hour extraction process to ensure it contains intense flavour.
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Currently, they have two cans of coffee available: the Black 100% Arabica beans and the Oat Milk – both of which are packed with two shots of espresso.
All their drinks are 100% plant based with no added sugar and are served in some of the best coffee shops around the world – as well as on the high-street in major retailers.
Minor Figures have four types of Nitro Cold Brew vegan coffees:
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Black — Cascading coffee. Mocha — Cascading coffee, Oat Milk and cocoa. Latte — Cascading coffee and Oat Milk. Chai Latte — Cascading Chai Latte, spiced tea + Oat Milk.
Their packaging is extremely on-brand, too – giving commuters a cracking option for an eco-friendly can of coffee.
Union Coffee
https://www.instagram.com/p/CAr93brng1K/
Now here’s something a little different for those still WFH but have had a surge in their workload: Cold Brew Coffee Concentrate from Union Coffee.
Arriving in packaging reminiscent of boxed wine; this hand roasted cold coffee is poured via a tap!
It can be served over ice, blended with milk, or even shaken into an espresso martini.
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The three-litre box has 40 servings of pure, strong coffee so this is definitely going to keep your eyes open for the days scheduled Zoom calls…
You can purchase a box on their website. Once opened, it ca be kept in the fridge for up to four weeks.
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Review | ‘This is a night to remember, Manchester’ – Jason Derulo’s Co-op Live debut
Amy Williams
Who’s ready for another throwback night? Because this was absolutely a night already full of nostalgia and one to remember.
American singer-songwriter Jason Derulo hit Co-op Live last night as part of his ‘The Last Dance World Tour’, famous for hit songs like ‘Whatcha Say’, ‘Talk Dirty’, and ‘Savage Love’ – we all remember the Covid TikTok dance, don’t we? – as well as many more.
With over 250 million singles sold and tens of billions of streams, you best believe his one night in Manchester was sold out.
Running through the big hits and everything in between, he and his dancers made it a proper party atmosphere on this fine Saturday evening.
He did his throwback songs and more; from the moment he said, “We’re throwing it back to the beginning, back to 2009″, we knew his first debut single, ‘Whatcha Say’, was about to grace our ears, and that it did.
He also brought back absolute classics like ‘Ridin’ Solo’ (I definitely lost my voice during this one) In My Head and It Girl.
The Last Dance run of shows has seen him visit places like Leeds, London, Glasgow and Birmingham, finishing his UK leg right here in Manchester, before he carries on to Europe, but we’re confident our date had the best crowd so far.
And just when you think this couldn’t get any better, he brought his little boy on stage to say hi to everyone, too – shattered everyone’s hearts.
He has that many hit songs, it wasn’t possible to get through them all, so his DJ halfway through did a mash-up of songs he’s also written and featured in, including ‘I Gotta Feeling’ by Black Eyed Peas, ‘Secret Love Song’ with Little Mix and ‘Replay’ by Iyaz.
We knew his voice was amazing – but can we have a moment for this man’s dance moves, keeping everyone on their feet at Co-op Live tonight, and his dancers made everyone want to start dance lessons tonight too, an absolutely incredible performance by all.
Jason Derulo told the audience, “This is a night to remember Manchester’, and that it absolutely was.
The story behind Sâlo: the rising Georgian-born Salford artist set be one of the region’s next stars
Danny Jones
We always love stories of people moving to Manchester to be more creatively engaged, but tales of entire families relocating here for a better life and art being born out of it is something truly special – and besides her obvious talent, that’s what has attracted us and plenty others to Sâlo.
This up-and-coming Salfordian artist may have been born around the border between Eastern Europe and Western Asia during a particular fraught time for her country, but she’s been raised and moulded like so many of us by this city’s rich music culture and wider artistic heritage.
She came to the UK with her family as a baby, with her parents fleeing poverty and lingering friction in Georgia following the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 90s, and their journey as asylum seekers eventually brought them here to the North West.
It was clear from a young age that Sâlo (short for Salome) had a gift for the piano, but it was when her family moved to the Greater Manchester area that her own interest in genres and styles began to develop. Here’s a little snippet of her recent performance at the stunning Stoller Hall.
This short video was taken from her feature in a recent episode of Manchester: Unplugged, the web series by StreamGM that launched just last year and spotlights local songwriters.
Honing in on one of her newest releases, ‘Set Me Free’, which taps into that pure love for the keys.
While this clip shows a stripped-back version of the fully-fledged electronic studio version, with production playing a key role in defining her sound, she blends everything from classical music and jazz to neo-soul as well as drum and bass.
You hear the phrase ‘genre-bending’ thrown around a lot these days, but if this mid-20s star in the making isn’t the epitome of that term, then we don’t know who is.
Speaking more about her background in the short documentary film, which aired on YouTube this week, she talks about her first memory of visiting Forsyth Music Shop in Manchester city centre, and the inspiration behind the track in question.
You watch the Sâlo episode of Manchester: Unplugged in full here.
Detailed in the description of the newest edition of the online show, “Classically trained from the age of four, Sâlo’s journey runs through some of Manchester’s most important music spaces”, including time spent at the RNCM and Chetham’s School of Music and more.
As for the tune itself, not only do the lyrics revolve around a difficult patch in a personal relationship – this being one of the first times she felt like she’s fully opened up and not held back on letting people know what she’s speaking about – but it’s also the first track she’s produced and mixed entirely on her own.
Painstakingly mastered from a small studio at home, she almost “fell out of love” with the song altogether, but getting back to that simple joy of playing piano helped revive her passion for it.
With a stunning voice, natural musical talent when it comes to her instrument, and a great blend of different analogue and digital influences, Sâlo is definitely one to watch moving forward.
Jess Walmsley -
14th July 2020 
