Food and drink in Manchester

Have a sweet tooth? In Manchester, you’re in luck: there’s no shortage of places to pick up a sugary treat, no matter the time of day. Stop for afternoon tea at the Tea Hive, where you’ll have towering trays of cakes and other nibbles to choose from. Then there’s the Chocolate Café, which does what it says on the tin, and Hey Little Cupcake!, where creative cupcakes come in flavours ranging from honeycomb and nutella to red velvet and lemon meringue. 

The British craft beer scene is going from strength to strength, and nowhere is that more evident than in Manchester. For starters, the city is host to the Independent Manchester Beer Convention, which ranks among the best craft beer festivals in the UK (and which is also hosted in the picturesque Victoria Baths, a beautiful local landmark). Then there’s hometown hero Cloudwater, a young upstart that’s already been ranked by RateBeer as the fifth best brewery in the world. Add in the bottle shops, beer bars, and other sudsy stops, and it becomes clear: sampling the local brews is a Manchester must.

But beer isn’t the only beverage that Manchester takes seriously. The city is also in the midst of a serious java obsession, which is good news for visitors who can’t go without their daily flat white fix. Takk — an Icelandic-inspired coffee shop — nails the Scandi vibe, while Fig + Sparrow is both a coffee shop and a lifestyle store. Would you rather have a cuppa than a cappuccino? Not to worry: North Tea Power caters to caffeine swillers of all stripes.