Hotels

  • New menu, same high quality from Malmaison – gastro gallery

    To get an invitation to try the new menu at Malmaison Manchester is to be filled with trepidation and anticipation. Trepidation because how could it match up to previous experiences: Fall fork first into autumn at Malmaison Malmaison brings the Millennial touch to Afternoon Tea  It did and it was fabulous. Tried and tested for

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  • eXchange Food and Drink Lounge – call me ☎️

    It’s a rare day I pick up when my phone rings. It’s a hell freezes over day I call someone else. I’m not a monster, a social pariah, arrogance personified. I guess you could call me the ultimate screener. But it’s not through a sense of selecting who I want to talk to. It’s more

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  • Bowled over by the Hilton

    Brought up by cricket-loving parents. I can boast that I was there at the infamous Headingley Test in 1981. I was barely stringing a sentence together given my young years what’s new? (Good one, me. Who just wrote that too. About me) … but I was there. And so with that grounding, I had no

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  • Fall fork first into autumn at Malmaison

    After a summer of outdoor activities, beer gardens and sun terraces (yes, even in Manchester, naysayers), October heralds a time for taking it back indoors . Personally happy to see the back of light summer salads, all I can see ahead is a series of extended Sunday lunches with friends and family and delicious decadent dinners. Autumn

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  • Brasserie Abode – bringing it home.

    It was on a balmy night in Manchester when Brasserie Abode threw open its doors, banged on its bongos and welcomed Manchester into its loving, refurbished arms. If the recently rebranded bar and restaurant is anything like its welcome party, us mancs (born and honorary) are in for a treat. Last Thursday I got a

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  • Malmaison brings the Millennial touch to Afternoon Tea 

    When I was young, I had two major concerns about getting older: I wouldn’t be allowed to wear my hair in a ponytail anymore; and  What would I do about coffee mornings – I hated coffee and indeed tea. What world I was living in where the latter was a real worry, I don’t know.

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  • Hotel Football (bloody hell*)

    First job is to clarify I’m not a red. I’m not even a blue. I’m a blue and white halves. Declaring yourself as an honorary manc is one thing. Should this be extended to declaring yourself to be an honorary Manchester United fan is simply just… I was going to say ‘glory hunting’ but I

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