By Neil Sowerby
THE Manchester city centre culinary scene currently resembles a beauty competition as barely a week goes by without a stunning new bar/restaurant opening its doors. The interiors are a sleek aspirational pageant cocking a snook at the homespun, the street food, all those NQ bars that pay homage to potting sheds and log cabins. All the slinky newcomers, Fazenda, Sakana, San Carlo Fumo and, opening this Friday (Dec 5) Gusto, are lavish enough to earn scorn from the London critics who pan Mancdom for its style over substance, putting a good night out ahead of a gourmet night out.
Not that you can’t eat rather well at any of the places just mentioned, but booze is obviously high on their priority list with prominent bar areas and a great attention paid to the wine and cocktail lists.
Take Gusto – a rebranding flagship for a Living Ventures chain that has been overtaken by its upstart siblings, Australasia, Alchemists, Artisan. The straight A’s I call them, but I’m awarding a bar Baccalaureat to the new place occupying the old Olive Press site on Lloyd Street. More than a million quid has been spent on recreating a Grand Cafe look.
Think Paris first of all, then all those Chris Corbin/Jeremy King places in Europe – The Wolseley, The Delaunay and most of all, their new Brasserie Zedel in Piccadilly. The first two do a whole day rolling carte of Mitteleuropa specialities from breakfast, through lunchtime choucroute, through Kaffee mit Kuchen, through to a romantic dinner (at The Wolseley I once snatched mussels at midnight after the theatre). Zedel aspires more to be a buffed up Brasserie Lipp.
At Gusto the menu offering is more of a hybrid, with strong nudges towards towards Italy, but also brasserie classics and transatlantic indulgences such as Lobster Thermidor. On a trial visit, though my eyes kept straying from the food towards the glorious square bar bang in the middle of Gusto. Hours could be lost occupying a stool and road-testing (as in “one for the road”) the cocktail list (TOM recommends Figs and Honey, crafted fromMonkey Shoulder and tawny port, fresh figs and honey) or deciding whether you prefer the Chassagne Montrachet to the Meursault (go for the former). You can even eat at the bar, which is good.
In response to an Alex Ferguson jibe about Arsenal’s 2002 Double winning side, Arsene Wenger came up with the legendary quote: “Everyone thinks they have the prettiest wife at home.”
With the city centre’s new quartet of lovelies it’s probably going to be down to personal preferences. For the red-blooded it might be Fazenda where meats are carved at table for you and the wine list is suitably robust; if saki, sushi and a six metre high recreation of a Japanese maple tree rocks your bot go for Sakana, if it’s an exquisite interior designed by Bernard Carroll, cocktails designed by Jamie ‘Liquorists’ Jones and cicchetti designed by Italians for centurois launch your gondola go for San Carlo Fumo; I’ve got a hot date with that bar at Gusto. I’ll let you know how our relationship gets on.
Gusto Manchester, 4 Lloyd Street, M2 5AB. 0161 832 2866, gustorestaurants.uk.com.
Gusto already has several restaurants in Didsbury, Alderley Edge, Cheadle Hulme and Knutsford, as well as further afield in Liverpool and Newcastle. Expect them all to transform into Grand Cafe beauties.
Fazenda, The Avenue, Spinningfields, Manchester M3 3HF. http://fazenda.co.uk/manchester/
Sakana, 23 Peter Street, Manchester M2 5QR. 0161 834 1898, http://www.sakanapan-asian.co.uk
San Carlo Fumo Manchester, 1 St Peter’s Square, Oxford Road, M2 3DE. 0161 236 7344.
A GALLERY OF THE NEW GUSTO
