HERE is a first look at the reborn El Gato Negro, which opens on February 22. It has come a long way from its first incarnation in a Pennine pub. Where once you looked out on a busy Ripponden road junction or sodden moorland now the panorama from floor to ceiling windows is a stylish pedestrian parade, King Street in central Manchester – and even the ‘For Let’ signs are diminishing as, a la Spinningfields, it seeks to reinvent itself away from struggling retail.
There have been some excellent restaurant fit-outs recently, notably Cottonopolis, Fazenda, Iberica and the King Street Townhouse (in Booth Street, not a Gato neighbour) but this one is something special. Quill, the high end food/bar pioneer along this stretch has a thing about feathers, hence the quirky stuffed ravens.
Well chef/patron Simon Shaw’s ‘Black Cat’ over its three splendidly restored floors is far quirkier than Quill. From Mark Kennedy’s mosaic of John Cooper Clarke and Frank Sidebottom in the street level wine and charcuterie bar to toby jugs, including a Mr T from the A-Team, and a salvaged rusty cross adorning the second floor cocktail bar with the retractable roof this Spanish restaurant distances itself from cod Iberian decor (with apologies to Iberica’s Matador lamps).
It’s the same with the food and drink. The wine list may be entirely Spanish, but it doesn’t make a big deal about stocking a huge range of the country’s cultish gins a la Lunya. As with the rest of the spirits list beverage manager Garry Foy (ex-Panacea and Elixir) has picked only the most distinctive. He is a true artist at work (abstract canvasses he has painted loom massively above that well-stocked bar). TOM is salivating at the prospect of Ferdinand’s Saar gin, infused with German Riesling, but which of the arcanely flavoured tonics to match it with? I’m sure we’ll get good advice.
The same with the dining. All the vital Spanish ingredients are there – starting with the cured meats downstairs carved to order on a butcher’s block, morcilla Scotch eggs and cheese from across the peninsula, perfect for a nibble with a sherry at the long wooden bar Barrafina-style.
The middle floor is a 50-cover restaurant, offering all the theatre of an open kitchen centred around an epic piece of Barcelona kit – a Josper charcoal grill. So grilled meats and fish will be a huge draw – the likes of onglet steak with patatas a lo pobre and rack of baby pork ribs with Pedro Ximénez glaze.
We wouldn’t neglect all the Ripponden-perfected signature dishes – Catalan food filtered through the sensibility of a chef trained in high end restaurants, notably as Harvey Nichols’ executive head chef. Shaw’s especially good with fish, shipping in only the finest raw materials. We like his clams with sherry; El Gato Negro’s (ex-Savoy) general manager Phil Bennett has been converted to the wondrous charms of hake since joining the King Street launch team.
Shaw says: “We’ve been careful to make the most of our new home in Manchester and to maintain the intimacy and character which has always been a key appeal of El Gato Negro. We wanted to make this a venue that is inviting, comfortable and that will appeal to those looking to drop by for half an hour over a selection of tapas and a glass of wine or sherry, as much as it will for those taking time to enjoy a bigger occasion.”
The huge plus to the new site – centuries old creaky, hence the delays involved in restoring it – is the top floor Black Cat Cocktail Bar. The roof can be removed and, more important, with fickle Manchester weather in mind, put back in a minute. Focus of attention beyond the stunning array of bottled is that wrought iron cross pinned shrinelike to a strip of that crumbly original brickwork with candles in the cavities.
There’s also a haunting painting of a toddler in a Arab headdress – another of Garry Foy’s reclaimed treasures. They call him ‘Alan’. Yes, Alan, not Juan. This cool cat is not your normal tapas bar.
El Gato Negro Tapas, 52 King Street, Manchester M2 4LY. It officially opens on Monday, February 22.
The landscape images of the restaurant and bar areas are by JOBY CATTO of anti-limited.
