It’s beginning to feel a lot ike Christmas, Bring on the twinkly lights and the cocktails. Fun as well as food is part of the festive feast…

‘Parallel universes’ spring to mind. The restaurant and chef of the year shortlists for the recent This Is Manchester Awards had only a single nomination in common with similar categories in the Manchester Food and Drink Awards, whose results will be announced in January. 

That was Skof with its profile hard to ignore. At the helm Tom Barnes, who ran the 3 Michelin starred L’Enclume for Simon Rogan. Yet even this seems an afterthought on a list majoring in fancy venues. Take your pick of the other restaurants from 20 Stories, Australasia, EastZeast, Fazenda, Fenix, MAYA, MUSU, Ribeye, San Carlo Alderley Edge, The Ivy Spinningfields.

Skof can’t be accused of such flash, rehashing that old bare brick/post-industrial trope. Another recent incomer Blacklock the chops specialist follows that interior template too as they bid to ‘fit into’ Mancunia.

The Manc Mykonos – Fenix rising 

The boot, spangly, on the other foot, step forward Fenix as ‘Leading Restaurant (Formal)’. Yes formal can include a shimmeringly glam take on some Mykonos windmills of the mind, featuring curvy, sea cave surfaces, an ‘olive tree’ and lighting that glows like an Aegean sunset in the bar, while the upstairs restaurant boasts “ash-toned driftwood dining chairs paired with decadent marble tables and refined tableware.” 

Still I don’t have insurmountable issues with that choice. Across three visits I have had some outstandingly good refined Greek food. And the cocktail offering is playfully mythic. I’d recommend Heracles’ Eighth Trial.

It also shared (strangely since it opened last November) the ‘Outstanding Debut of the Year’ award with Sexy Fish, which I’ve visited twice for cocktail and fine wine related dinners. Yes, that fantasy on the former Armani site is all about Instagrammable piscine pzazz. but I didn’t feel a fish out of water. It was fun with some fine Japanese-inspired food, even if it lags behind the menu at nearby three AA rosette MUSU (or KAJI as it has morphed into, still lavishly glam, too, even when promoting fire-based cooking as one element, 

Still this is a shark eat shark world in the tussle for the glitzy dollar. Leaving aside Sexy Fish’s relentless stablemate The Ivy, the golden touch, homegrown at that, seems currently to belong to the Jones Brothers.Trading as the Permanently Unique Group, Adam and Drew have already successfully extended their upmarket Chinese brand Tattu to London and plans are advanced for a Fenix and a Louis to follow.

Elevated veal shank and broken down tarts

Ah, Louis. Maybe it was the crooning or the presence of celebs I couldn’t recognise (good luck with the Jungle, Colleen) but only the rip tide of Champagne buoyed me through the launch party in Spinningfields. A return visit to road-test the Italian-American menu has won me over big time. It was a comped meal with the inclusion of one of my favourite Chiantis, but such largesse would never subvert my critical faculties. 

The osso buco alla milanese was especially magnifico. This rich, braised on-the bone veal shank dish with saffron risotto was a favourite of Frank Sinatra’s. So it’s perfect for Manchester’s own homage to a colourful New York past where guys dined dolls after Manhattans on the rocks. Such affectations may grate with some folk but when paired with spot-on service go with the flow.

Slow-cooked shank, pulled lamb this time, shows up in a Fenix dish that has survived the recent menu change. A parsnip bechamel, truffles and mushrooms are baked with it tarte tatin style in delicate pastry. It is served on crockery appropriate to  its name, Broken Down Tart, a playful nod to the Greek tradition of plate smashing. I preferred it to the inevitable plate of wagyu.

Let’s get lit up for Christmas… and the Octopus Oasis

Fenix also upholds another swanky tradition by draping its facade in a myriad seasonal lights. Celeb haunt Rosso back in the day exhausted considerable wattage in the same way and its successor up in Spring Gardens, Cibo, offers a more muted version. Neither can provide a back storey to match Fenix’s. Their lights are “inspired by the story of Karavari – a Greek custom where children carried illuminated boats while singing carols to bless the sailors of the Aegean seas”. 

Meanwhile, back at Sexy Fish, where the decor is an entire Aegean Sea in its own right (check out the Octopus Oasis, next to the main bar).I do recommend a generous wine and matching food event in the Tropical Reef Private Dining Room that should be a regular fixture in the New Year. It’s called ‘Wine and Waves’, the  latter their name for the those Japanese-influenced small plates.

Some seriously goo/d wines featured in the W&W debut – Krug Champagne, Leflaive Burgundy and and a glorious Alsace Riesling from Rolly Gassman, presented by knowledgeable head sommelier Davide Rinaldi.

If that’s not your £125 a head bag, book in for Sexy Fishmas: “Immerse yourself in a sparkling holiday wonderland with a limited-edition omakase menu and festive cocktails, surrounded by thousands of golden fish baubles for a truly unforgettable Christmas experience.”

MUSU is now KAJI and Moffat is at MAYA

A real fish, in the shape of a giant bluefin tuna being butchered, was one of the unlikeliest restaurant attractions in 2024 Manchester (followed by a meal) and we may not see such sell-out session again as the John Dalton Street venue reinvents itself as the Musu Collection. Sushi/sashimi led omakase will return inn 2025 along with a basement fined dining showcase for new chef Steve Smith. For the moment he’s leading fire-based dining experience KAJI in the main dining room, which has re-jigged its giant screen-led decor without shedding the glitz. A relaunch meal showed no sign of slipping standards. 

Smith made his name helming Ribble Valley gastropub. Interesting to see how it goes. Ditto with Shaun Moffat, whose very British approach and technical skills at the Edinburgh Castle gastropub in Ancoats won him Chef of the Year in the 2023 MFDF Awards. He’s now charged with turning around the kitchen at MAYA.

When I reviewed the place under previous chef Gabe Lea I was disturbed by an  interior so penumbral I couldn’t read the menu. Little has changed it appears, reading a review of the new regime by the brilliant Olivia Potts for Manchester Confidential…

“The enormous cocktail bar at the centre of the room is beautiful, all gold and glass and plush stools, but it’s also dominating and it leaves the dining room feeling cramped. Diners are squeezed in closely and I almost knock over the wine glasses on our table when I sidle in, which I feel very stupid about – until the table next to us does exactly the same thing when they sit down. It does rather feel like eating a sit-down, three course dinner in a cocktail bar, rather than a dining room.”

Baby Daisy or Barnsley Chop – take your pick

I introduced Olivia to Shaun’s food back at The Edinburgh Castle and I too am a huge fan, in particular of his immaculate sourcing. How all this switch will pan out, it will be interesting to see, at an entertainment  destination currently promoting (get your glad rags on for December 13) “Internationally renowned Burlesque artist, Baby Daisy, performing a brand new show created exclusively for MAYA. Playfully called MAYAnage et trois, guests can expect an evening of glamour, sensuality and dazzling allure.”

But will there be a Wild Boar Barnsley Chop? That was the Moffat EC dish that convinced me of his exceptional talent, honed by running East London kitchens such as Manteca. Funny old world. One floor of MAYA, inside a listed building, does that distressed brick/post-industrial schtick.

Cast your MFDF Awards votes online now

As a long-serving judge I might biased but these eight nominations for Restaurant of the Year are where the food does the talking:

Adam Reid At The French, Another Hand, Higher Ground, Mana, Restaurant Örme (Urmston), The Pearl (Prestwich), Skof, Where the Light Gets In. 

The closing date for votes is midnight on the 10th January 2025. Vote for your winner in all 17 categories here.