ON a day when the ramifications of Brexit shove all else aside a poignant piece of local restaurant news has crept under the radar – a closure. No, not the veteran city centre Chinese, the Kwok Man. I’ve no reason to mourn its passing. I mean Damson.
Surely that shut last September? No that was the Media City offshoot that lasted three years. We mean the original in Heaton Moor, which is to undergo a major revamp altering its culinary direction. It will be more casual, buzz word de nos jours (oops, outed myself as a Remainer).
I’ve a soft spot for this neighbourhood restaurant that gave a hardened hack the chance to be the ‘lovely companion’ of national critic Tracey MacLeod.
A PR pal in London had suggested I was a good bet to eat out with when she was up for the MIF 2009; I steered her towards this newcomer co-run by Steve Pilling and his former chef at the Chop Houses, Simon Stanley.
For Tracey it was love at first sight (Damson, not me). She described it as “a place any one of us would kill to have on our local high street… “Everything about it works wonderfully well; the stylish, understated room, the friendly, well-informed young staff and, best of all, the menu full of things you really want to eat, from baked sea-bass with ragout of squid and tomato to sirloin steak and ‘real chips’.”
The formula of stylish neighbourhood fine dining has stayed the same, but the writing was on the wall when the more ambitious Salford Quays sibling went under and Pilling (above) and Stanley converted part of the Heaton Moor Road site into a tapas joint called La Cantina.
Now In an email to customers Pilling said: “It is the end of an era, tinged with both sadness and excitement. We are looking forward to the future.
"May I take this opportunity to thank our loyal customers for all your support. It has been a pleasure. We will be open early April with our new casual dining offering and we look forward to welcoming you.”
Coincidentally, La Cantina tweeted an image announcing a new rival on the drag, promising rotisserie, wood-fired pizza and craft beer – the hipster holy trinity. Meanwhile, across the road, another Pilling project, The Moor Top pub, is getting the TLC it desperately required in a major renovation.
Pilling and Stanley have a good track record with pubs. Their now abandoned collaboration with Robinsons Brewery, the Red Lion at High Lane, offered some exemplary pub grub, reminiscent of their glory days at Mr Thomas’s and Sam’s Chop Houses.
The two Dockyards (at Media City and Spinningfields Left Bank) were joined by The Gasworks brewpub late last year at First Street and the business partners have quietly taken on The Dog and Partridge on Wilmslow Road, Didsbury (with strong rumours of a new La Cantina nearby).
Chuck in some lower profile involvement in city centre bars and you can see why Pilling and Stanley were named in the 2017 Northern Restaurant Bar show Top 50 industry movers and shakers.
The original Damson has always been the pick of the crop for me, but perhaps it was in a rut. Cannily repositioned, it may yet blossom again.
Damson, 113 Heaton Moor Rd, Stockport, Cheshire SK4 4HY. 0161 432 4666.