SleuthSleuth is a sideways glance at the city every week, it's the truth, but Sleuth's truth. He's several people all at once. We give £25 for every story/rumour and piece of absurdity you find for us to publish. Sleuth sometimes even gets serious. We ask for the money back if any legal action follows. Follow Sleuth on twitter @mcrsleuth
TEA 42 is opening later this month on High Street opposite the Arndale Market. They must be very keen to wow the glamour crowd thinks Sleuth. Apparently this is an alternative tearoom experience, backed by aparthotel company Blue Rainbow. It will create up to 40 jobs, launch next week, and serve a large selection of 'speciality, hand-blended teas, locally-sourced cakes and high-quality light refreshments'. Head Chef Martin Small is leaving four years behind at the National Trust's Lyme Park, Disley to join the team. Produce for Tea 42 has been sourced from local companies, such as Great North Pie Co and jam and chutney specialists, ‘Galore!’. There's a big emphasis on gluten-free.
Now Sleuth loves tea in the morning. Picks him up and gets him started. But tea all day? "I'm not a Buddhist monk? Is there something less totally tea?" he asked like a whingy alcholic teen.
"Indeed," came the reply, "there will be an extensive wine list and beer selection."
Phew.
"Bit of a confusing name, then?" suggested Sleuth. "Oh and I'd like to become a chutney specialist. Where do you apply?"
Sleuth's Lyme Park Joke
Sleuth was once conducting a pub tour around Manchester and one of the guests was from High Lane close to Lyme Park. "You're about to get a massive theme park, did you know that?" said Sleuth. "Are we? The traffic's already terrible on the A6 there. What's it called?" said the guest in mortal terror. "Disleyland," said Sleuth. It was such a good joke several of the people on the tour collapsed to the floor laughing so hard. Fortunately Sleuth had his pocket defibrillator to hand.
Kowloon Correspondents Club Opens In The Barton Arcade
Kowloon in BartonIf you stand still long enough in an empty unit in Manchester a bar will eventually form around you created by cocktail maestros The Liquorists. Cunningly this will be sponsored by a drinks brand - more profit, hurrah. This has happened in The Barton Arcade with the Kowloon Correspondents Club featuring Belvedere Polish vodka. You have to hand it to the Liquorists boys though they provide a cracking atmosphere and great drinks in their pop-ups.
Sleuth is intrigued by one brew on their 'passport' of drinks taking in destinations on the way to Kowloon. The Single Step, the Manchester cocktail, features an infusion of Salford IPA. Ale in a vodka cocktail. Odd. Beguiling too.
There's an old-style typewriter at the bar to fit with the 'correspondents' theme. Sleuth explained the archaic machine to the very young placement person as 'a manual alphabetical sorting machine'. She nodded in agreement.
Sleuth And The Neville
Sea Life at The Trafford Centre has a new occupant, a zebra shark called Neville which has been transferred from Blackpool Sea Life to a bigger tank. The shark looks familiar. "Is it called Neville after Gary Neville?" asked Sleuth. "No," came the reply. "Has this fish not completed a remarkable transformation from grumpy Scouse-baiter to television pundit par excellence? Is this fish called Neville not financing a fan's hotel close to Old Trafford, the Theatre of Scots Managers?" asked Sleuth. "No," came the fish-faced reply, "it is not that Neville."
Sleuth's Blue Night For Winning Blues
The Manchester Tourism Awards this week gave United fans a gleeful grin. Manchester United Museum and Stadium Tour was named the ‘Large Visitor Attraction of the Year’ while The Manchester City Stadium Experience was given the ‘Small Visitor Attraction’ award. Ouch.
Sleuth's Videos Of The Week
Sleuth's been entertained and impressed by two videos this week. One is an old one he's just caught up with of a frustrated dog trying to revitalise a very metal Alan Turing in Sackville Gardens, by getting the scientist, who died in 1954, to throw a stick. The other is a charming one of Manchester done for the recent design festival.
Sleuth Is In Heaven
Sleuth is in heavenSleuth charged into Bottega like a man deranged when he saw the menu. The old Aubaine site in Selfridges is now run by the San Carlo boys and they've put snails on the menu. Ah snails, aka escargot in French, snailios in Italian, escargotskis in Russian, snailuntblitzens in German, Sleuth loves them. He devoured these versions quicker than you could say Francois Hollande. Which other restaurants in Manchester sell snails? Anyone? Come on restaurants, more animal goo on the menu.
Sleuth, Lloyds, HS2, Gavin Esler And That Bloody Paper
Gavin EslerSleuth was at the Big Picture event hosted by Lloyd's Bank in the Imperial War Museum North on Thursday. Sleuth loves the place as a venue for a dinner and discussion: he really knows of nowhere else where you can dine within a few metres of an atomic bomb and, if you're on table 17, directly under a twisted burnt piece of the Twin Towers.
Clive Memmott, Chair of Manchester Chamber of Commerce was on a panel discussing the region and business. Gavin Esler, Newsnight presenter, was the host.
Memmott talks a lot of very good sense and therefore is a passionate supporter of HS2.
One of his points was that the current rail system only allows freight from the south east to the north west to travel at an average of 23mph. Ludicrous in 2013, slower than it was hundred years ago. As the argument developed, Esler asked, "Does anybody not want HS2?" Almost no hands went up as Memmott said loudly, "Yes, The Daily Mail." "Don't The Daily Mail claim HS2 causes cancer?" quipped Esler to more laughs. Probably, thought Sleuth, and doesn't the idiot paper of the 1930s also claim HS2 was originally a Communist plan proposed by Ed Miliband's dad?
The Quays on Thursday 7 November
Sleuth Goes To Town
Every seven days or so Sleuth is stopped in the street by policemen, concierges, Gavin Esler, Belvedere Vodka cocktails, teetotallers, zebra sharks, high speed trains, a man called Avo and all the snails in Delamere Forest and asked: "Where in the region can I find a wonderful diorama of a local town?"
"Why," says Sleuth, "that would be in Stockport Art Gallery; a massive panorama of the town by Neil Dimelow. It's wonderful but hurry as it finishes on Sunday, although you can visit them in the parish church."
And to prove this he showed the policemen, concierges, Gavin Esler, Belvedere Vodka cocktails, teetotallers, zebra sharks, high speed trains, a man called Avo and all the snails in Delamere Forest, this picture.
Part of TOWN by Neil Dimelow
