Been inspired to write about this lovely place after no less than TWO successful visits.

Really helpful, friendly staff.  Good prices for quality food and decent portion sizes.  Both times my jacket potato has been nice and hot (chilli and cheese last time – tomatoey and tasty) and barely fit in the box they give you.

All the food is given to take away but you can sit in if you want to, so none of that needless faffing you get at fast food joints about ‘tray or bag’ when you don’t even know if there’s room to sit in yet.

Filling, tasty, well-priced, friendly staff, and they’ve got a carvery too – look forward to trying it next time.  Strongly recommended.

To the Soup Cave! (Kitchen).

Based on Spear Street, the Soup Kitchen appears to be a pub which also has a hot food counter, an unusual set up which was new to me, but worked just fine as you can get food to go, without any wait, or sit down and have it with a steaming cold draught beer.

The menu is short and simple, I get the impression it changes regularly due to its scrawled chalkboard appearance. Soups on offer today included beetroot and horseradish, roasted tomato, pea and ham and cream of cauliflower, along with an equally limited selection of sandwiches. The lack of choice is no bad thing though as it’s clear all food is fresh, homemade and put together with care. I appreciate the approach of “do a small menu and do it well”.

I went for the pea and ham soup which was generously ladled out of a hotwell into a polystyrene cup (about 3/4 of a pint), my fellow hungry traveller went for the same soup and a ham salad sandwich.

The soup and sandwich combo will set you back £5.50, while everything is great quality, prepared to order and made the way you would make it at home, I still think this should have been under a fiver. The soup by itself was £3.60, this had better be the best soup I’ve ever tasted. It wasn’t.

It was very good soup but £3.60 to take it away in a disposable cup? That’s pretty steep.

All in all the food is great, lovingly prepared to order with fresh, quality ingredients, if they knocked a quid off everything on the menu, I’d be in there regularly, but with the prices the way they are, this may be a once in a blue moon kind of thing, if ever again. Shame really because it’s perfect cold weather, comfort food.

Back to Vertigo, and the other halves birthday was coming up which seemed like the perfect opportunity. Even better than that, a month before the big date they ran a deal on Groupon for their tasting menu – 6 course taster menu for two for £50, apparently down from £118.

I’m a fan of taster menu’s, a chance for the chef to show off and for the ‘taster’ to get small courses but all packed full of flavour.

The meal started well, restaurant seemed slightly quiet but it was mid week and did actually fill up as the evening wore on (and we got there at 8). Our waitress was friendly and easy going.

Starter was a tomato consomme which delivered on its promise of good flavour. Unfortunately though this was the highlight of the meal. I can’t even remember the other courses. They all sounded fantastic on the menu but in reality were just average. Flavours were lacking, the middle course of chicken was the size of a standard main and I could have cooked the chicken breast better than they did.

Had I paid full price for the meal the sense of disappointment would have been even greater. However, taking advantage of a special offer should not mean you get substandard food.

On top of this, booking the tasting menu in advance means they have as much time as possible to prepare it and make it perfect.

I walked in expecting 6 courses showcasing the best flavours and quality of cooking Vertigo had to offer. If I did then never go there and pay full price. There are many restaurants in Manchester that deliver far better food at reasonable prices.

I assume their aim with the Groupon offer was to introduce people to the restaurant so they came back. With me they failed and if what we had reflected what is cooked every night I can’t imagine many others would return either.

Please note rankings are reflective of what I would expect for that price.

A sign caught my eye for the “meal deal”, Fish, Chips, Peas, two slices of bread and a drink all for £6.50. A tad expensive I hear you cry, not when you see the size of the portions Cafe Lloyd serves up. Admittedly I do have a large appetite and I am overly greedy but when the plate arrived the size of the fish was incredible and it wasn’t a portion of chips, more like a mound, for the first time in ages I knew I would be full afterwards. The whole meal was amazing, the fish was freshly cooked, I like my chips soggy and peas mushy, Cafe Lloyd has got this down to a fine art.

If you like your fish & chips and would like to eat in pleasant surroundings, then you can’t beat Cafe Lloyd for a lunchtime grease fill.

A friend and I decided to go halves on the Mixed Italian platter to start with, which consisted of king prawns, meat balls, spare ribs, chicken wings, pate, with a selection of dips. The only bad thing I can say about the starter is that I had to share it with someone else, each item was amazingly tasty.

The selection of steaks at Giorgio’s is excellent and as I was feeling a bit flushed, I opted for the Fillet, after having a few beers I thought I would try the gorgonzola cheese & fresh cream sauce with the steak for something a bit different. All I can say about the main it is one of the best cooked pieces of Fillet steak I have had in a long long time, I asked for the standard “medium rare” and the chef didn’t disappoint, it was the perfect colour of pink all the way through, you could cut it with your fork.

I cannot speak highly enough about Giorgio’s, a nice Italian restaurant, the staff were excellent, it felt like they couldn’t do enough for you and were so nice and pleasant. To top it off the food was top drawer, the only con is it a little overpriced, but can be justified if all the dishes are as good as the ones I had.

If you have a bit of cash burning a hole in your pocket, want to be waited on hand and foot, whilst being served top drawer nosh, you can’t go far wrong with Giorgio’s

First thing I noticed was the conveyor belt through the centre of the restaurant, slowly trundling round with about 4 dishes on it. As I glanced round there were only two other people in the entire place. “How long have these plates been going round?” I whispered to myself, I was certainly going to order something a little fresher.

I opted for the 16 Piece Sushi and Sashimi special which came with a selection of Salmon, Tuna, Prawn, Squid (I think) and a couple of other items which I can’t seem recall what they actually were. “Nice selection” I thought, I’ll enjoy at least one, how disappointed I was. The whole thing seemed to lack flavour, I know you are meant to put some soy sauce on the dish to extract the taste, but I had to drown the plate in the stuff just to wake my taste buds up, even then all I could taste was the soy sauce.

The whole place seemed to lack atmosphere as well, it was your standard sushi style restaurant, but seemed to lack any energy or buzz, the staff did the bare minimum to accommodate us.

If you are a sushi fan you may like this place but for me the next time I go for sushi I will be looking for a small family style place that is a little more traditional/proper restaurant. The whole Samsi experience felt like they have bought a “My First Sushi Restaurant” kit from Japan, maybe that’s why the food and atmosphere lacked any substance.

I like my food. Cheap and plenty of it is my game. Zorba’s is the Greek outlet in the Food Court. Wide selection of your fave Greek treats such as kebabs, Stifado stew and so on.

Today I went for their Chicken & Spinach, with rice. A tasty meal of Chicken mixed with a herby spinach sauce. Decent portion, as with most places in the Food Court, served in a polystyrene tub. You can take-out as well, if you don’t fancy fighting for a table.

Good food, price isn’t so bad considering, would try again.

It’s hard to describe the flavour.  There’s a weird mix of the usual McD’s sausage patty (what the hell that’s made of it’s best not to discuss), their plastic cheese, I think maybe a hash brown, something that used to be bacon in a distant past life, a choice of generic Brown or Red sauce, and all this on a tortilla wrap.

The undulating journey your taste buds go on whilst eating one of these things actually causes them to occasionally fall asleep, and you suffer taste black-outs.  As though your mouth is not willing to process the insipid combination of ‘flavours’, as it were.  It’s a bit like someone else is eating it for you and describing it to you whilst you’re wearing ear-muffs, and standing in another room, with your mouth full of cotton wool.  It’s kind of filling, and it lasts longer than you’d expect if you can be bothered chewing it.  But, as is usual with SmackDee’s you really come out the other end of the experience a) still hungry, 2) markedly poorer, and D) needing the loo within the hour or so.

Clearly I deserved the experience for going into McDonalds in the first place, so I blame no one but myself.  Stupid golden stupid arches…

Without further ado here is Sissy’s dining experience.

The first thing I would like to say is OMG at last us vegetarians now have a cool veggie Bistro in the town centre and about time too.  Myself and my partner went on valentines weekend and we where both taken back by the simple yet classy decor of the place it’s not over designed which is a refreshing change these days.  The place feels very intimate and welcoming due to its size if you need the attention of the staff then it is very easy to get as you’re not looking miles across a room in the hope of catching a glimpse of a member of staff plus they are very attentive to your needs.  So the owner Damien welcomed us and made us feel relaxed and talked us through the menu and drinks deals which were 2 for one on sprits before 7pm I think.  As for the menu it was jaw droopingly tasty and appetising, it’s so refreshing being a vegetarian and having a whole menu to choose from it never really happens.  So after a while perusing the menu I decide on homemade lemon and sundried tomato pate with homemade, warmed rosemary flatbread and olive oil for starters and Lancashire cheese double baked soufflé with purple sprouting broccoli, lyonnaise potatoes and homemade relish for mains while my boyfriend goes for Spinach and feta parcel with little herb salad & halloumi ‘fish’, chips & mushy peas .  The food was just PERFECT after every bite came a smile, my boyfriend who is a meat eater absolutely loved his meal and said he felt really full after it and that it was a refreshing change to savour the flavours of vegetable based foods other than meaty flavours.  After our meal we relaxed on the comfortable chesterfield sofa and finished our drinks we even had a chat with the owner about how he managed to take the step from being employed to becoming self employed and why a veggie bistro.  He said that he felt he needed to take the risk of setting up on his own as it’s something he always wanted to do and am I GLAD he did take the risk as this is one type of place that Manchester town centre has been crying out for, so please do pop in and sample the delights and show your support for a risk taking entrepreneur.

Eight of us decided to try this place for a lunchtime birthday celebration.  Eight people stood in their doorway politely waiting to be seated.  Despite booking our table ahead of time, it took staff about 10 minutes to notice us.  They were dealing with maybe 4 other tables of customers, max.

When we were finally seated my initial dish of choice was a classic spicy chicken pizza as I wanted to try the intriguing and unique “wholemeal base” that their menu highlights.  Healthy pizzas?  Surely not!  I was quickly disappointed when they promptly informed me that they did not have any wholemeal bases at all.

I don’t know what the other tables had ordered (Mermaid’s Tit on Toast maybe?) but it took the best part of an hour for our food to arrive.  Make sure you have a few hours to spare if you ever hit Dough as a quick lunchtime visit is not recommended.

When at last it came, the food was delivered by smiling but unapologetic staff, and all 8 orders were provided at roughly the same time.  The meatballs were quite tasty, the mozzarella generous and thick.  The sauce was interesting, an unusual and pleasant combination of flavours.  The pasta wasn’t great, it had the plastic rubberiness of microwave meals but the whole dish was plentiful and filling.  I shared a garlic bread and was glad I didn’t order a whole one for myself.  It was dry and slightly stale, to moisten it we had to baste it in garlic butter which we robbed from someone else’s salad.

Manchester offers a plethora of Italian restaurants and you’d think this healthy competition would keep restaurateurs on their toes.  But the prevailing attitude seems to be much like the curry mile in Rusholme: if we sell it they will come anyway.

Interestingly, dairy free and gluten free diets are catered for so one individual who was ordinarily unable to eat pizzas was delighted at being able to eat a goat’s cheese version.  Frankly however, the table’s overall opinion was that we should have just gone to Pizza Express.  Eyeballing their menu online had my mouth watering at the possibilities, yet the experience as a whole was a disappointment.  There is no excuse for service that slow, there was no apology or concession offered, and the food was good but not outstanding.