By Neil Sowerby
LESS than a month after iconic shoe retailers Edwards of Manchester abruptly shut up shop on Deansgate after 185 years of trading comes news of a more contemporary icon moving in.
Solita, doyens of dirty food, creators of the the Big Manc Burger and the Widowmaker hot dog combo, plan to open their fourth outlet in the glorious Barton Arcade, which in its quiet way may become a cosier dining alternative to the mega multi-eaterie Corn Exchange taking shape not far away.
Pot Kettle Black, a superior coffee shop is already in situ along with Bistrovin, where you can enjoy the pick of Spirited Wines bottles for a minimum mark-up with the best charcuterie and cheese plates in town. Award-winning Catalan tapas outfit Lunya arrives soon with great expectations.
So how does Solita fit in? Their latest is a surprise with their third restaurant, in Prestwich, still to open after five months of complex renovation of the former Aumbry and its neighbouring joint. I bumped into Solita boss Franco Sotgiu at Hawksmoor last week and he promised it would launch in August.
Expect the menus there to be much the same as at the Northern Quarter original and Didsbury – the likes of the Widowmaker (for £16.90 you get 24 inches of all-beef banger, smoked brisket chilli, chow chow slaw, deep-fried jalapenos, Monterey Jack, bacon and ball park mustard) and the Big Manc (two six ounce minced chuck steak patties under a mountain of Monterery Jack and a flood of special sauce, iceberg lettuce and gherkin slices, all pinned together in a brioche bun for £14.90). Expect too lots of candied bacon and deep-frying.
Chances are, though, the Barton Arcade Solita, due to open in January 2016, will tune into the current vogue for wood-fired pizza, the best exemplars of which are Honest Crust, Rudy’s and PLY. Franco has mooted a specialist pizza place previously and with his Sardinian genes and background in professional oven retail, it looks the perfect fit.
Sotgiu also hopes the new Barton Arcade restaurant will relieve some of the strain on the swamped Northern Quarter restaurant.
"We're running at full capacity in the Northern Quarter, with two hour waiting times not uncommon," says Sotgiu, "so hopefully Barton Arcade will ease the pressure on our kitchen and also open up an untapped area of Manchester for us.”
