GUERRILLA EATS are back on Saturday, March 14, with a new venue on Shudehill and a promise of events even bigger and better than those that won them Best Street Food Collective in the 2014 British Street Food Awards.
Once again the tight amalgam of ‘bona-fide street traders’ formed in 2012 is in a city centre shoot-out with more recent arrivals B.Eat Street, winners of the 2014 Manchester Food and Drink Awards Best Pop-up or Event and currently wowing the crowds at the Great Northern Warehouse with their Friday FoodFights.
Add to the mix the arrival of Urban Food Fest from London, the original street food melting pot, to occupy Deansgate's Euro Car Park every Saturday night between 5pm and midnight from Saturday, February 28 until October and hipster food lovers may never have to sit down or even use cutlery to eat again.
Guerrilla Eats have certainly upped their game from the time the could get away with a cluster of vans on a pot-holed patch of land. Their new venue is the gloriously titled Wonder Inn at 29 Shudehill, during the week an organic cafe/wellness and yoga centre but transformed each Saturday night from 5pm to midnight for 12 weeks.
Many of the traders who made their last residency, in the Ancoats Fairbairn Building, a huge success will be back to occupy this three-story warehouse – lined up for a rolling rota are: Big Grillie Style, Rudy’s Neapolitan Pizza, Fat Annies, Bangers & Bacon's Chef's Table Dirty Food Revolution, Yakumama, Cow Boys, Dirty Dogs, Mumma Schnitzel, Madame Francoise, Ginger Tart and Barnhouse Bistro and Love From The Streets. Entry is free (children welcome until 9pm). Expect local craft beer and cocktails to flow. Follow @Guerrilla_Eats for weekly trader line-up announcements.
Across town the Urban Food Fest will already be up and running. It launches on February 28 in the Euro Car Park opposite the Deansgate pub, following a pattern established in London’s Shoreditch (and before that in New York, naturally).
Again free, it will feature 15 different street food trucks and stalls serving 'gourmet global street food dishes' plus premium drinks bars. It should be quite a magnet for transport geeks – expect converted horse-boxes, 60s French Citroen H vans, caravans, pick-up trucks, Italian Piaggios, Thai tuk-tuks and US ambulances.
Organisers say they will work with Manchester-based street vendors still to be revealed. Food on offer is expected to include British pork sliders, Venezuelan grilled chicken and black bean arepas, Italian ham and basil wood fired pizza, Mexican BBQ beef & hot sauce burritos, Middle Eastern falafel wraps, Spanish chorizo & chicken paella, chipotle chilli venison & slaw, tofu hot dogs with jalapeños & melted red cheese, Peruvian choripán with chimichurri and Greek lamb souvlaki with halloumi & charred red pepper.
Just along Deansgate, but on Fridays 5pm-11pm, the FridayFoodFights from B.Eat Street have unleashed their latest list (for Feb 20), which includes guests from Leeds, the Belgrave Music Hall-based Patty Smith’s Burgers alongside Manc regulars such as Nasi Lemak, Hungry Hombres, Yakumama and Tomfoolery at 34, who have switched from a dessert offering (Glamarang take over that role) to a menu featuring the likes of Salted Reuben Beef Sandwiches and Norfolk Fried Quails with Ponzu and Pickled Pear Salad.
Follow the build-up to the event on @beatstreetmcr.