Sleuth is a sideways glance at the city every week, it's the truth, but Sleuth's truth. He's several people all at once. Sleuth sometimes even gets serious @mcrsleuth
ALBERT’S SCHLOSS REPLACES BRANNIGANS
The gorgeous Albert Hall is set to reopen its ground floor, previously Brannigans, the world's greatest bar/club/pisstake (only one of these three choices is correct and the one you choose will say a lot about you). The name the people of Trof Group have chosen is the somewhat surprising Albert's Schloss which promises to be a 'Bohemian Pleasure Palace'. Er...right. Schloss is a German word for a castle or manor house. Bohemia is mostly the Czech Republic. The building was originally a Methodist meeting hall and church. Sleuth is at a complete schloss as to why Trof Group have chosen this name. Maybe the directors were all schlossed when they hit upon it. Meanwhile the recruitment ads call for 'weird and wonderful musicians, dancers, actors, singers'. Clearly Trof has no need for any weird and wonderful branding specialists, they're already fully tooled up with them.
SLEUTH, THE PAST AND THE DUTCH
Sleuth's favourite memory of Brannigans was when he was taking around an elderly group of Dutch visitors who were staying at the Midland Hotel and had ‘heard’ Brannigans was a ‘good night’. They insisted he take them and it certainly turned out to be a good night for one of their number. A seventy-five year old Dutch social housing consultant had to be physically carried back to his hotel after various incidents. First he’d bagged off with a forty-year-old Gorton divorcee, then he was caught by security in the toilet corridor having an intimate snog with said lady. As he was being dragged back to his hotel by his compatriots - who were of the opinion his wife might take a dim view of such shenanigans - he briefly escaped, jumped on a table (he was a spritely septagenarian) shouting, “This is life, this is sex!” It was perhaps the Low Countries’ lowest moment.
BrannigansTAPS POUR HOUSE TO CLOSE
First it was Lucha Libre to go in Great Northern Square, now pour-your-own-beer establishment Taps has announced that it is closing down at the end of August. The bar in Great Northern Square was sold last year to Manchester Business School student Chris Payne, along with upstairs champagne lounge Epernay. However, following a 'very hard year' it became clear Taps was 'no longer a viable business', according to a statement realeased by owners. Still, all is not lost, owners plan to open a new 60s-inspired beer bar. 60s beer? Pint of Bass please barkeep...
SUSHI & SHISHA FOR SPINNINGFIELDS...
Having had a bumper opening week on Oxford Street this week, Sleuth hears Newcastle-based grab'n'go sushi outfit, Nudo Sushi Box, have now secured a site in Spinningfields. Sleuth reckons Nudo should simply slip into the empty Samsi Japan unit on Hardman Boulevard and get to it. The sushi bar's still installed. Sleuth remembers visiting a Samsi on Whitworth Street for a Sumo banquet event where top Brit Sumo chappy, Sweaty Steve Pateman, told Sleuth he sank ten pints of milk a day to 'stay in shape'. Sweaty Steve was 20 stone. Unfortunately, Samsi Spinningfields soon became out of shape and, much like Sweaty Steve, went belly-up in 2012. A raw deal for the sushi outfit.
Nudo moving on SpinningfieldsMeanwhile, Spinningfields Indian street kitchen, Scene, have sneakily gone about knocking together one of the most fetching restaurant terraces Sleuth has ever seen. Designed by Northern Quarter design studio, NoChintz, the lush Scene veranda is Spinningfields first Shisha lounge and is a very handsome space to be indeed, Shisha or no. Shisha is a glass-bottomed water pipe in which fruit-scented tobacco is burnt using charcoal, passed through a 'Hookah' and inhaled through a hose. Devotees say the experience is cheap, relaxed and an unrushed experience. Unlike any Hookah experience Sleuth has ever heard of...
Scene's new verandaSLEUTH FINDS RELIEF ON SWAN STREET
Sleuth was amused by the Editor at Large, Schofield’s confusion this week. Sometimes you just can’t tell whether a bar is a bar or not in the Northern Quarter. Schofield walked down Swan Street on the way to The Smithfield pub to review it. He passed a venue called Lounge 56. 'Another bar', he thought but as it was closed he looked up the website. Turns out Lounge 56 is the sort of massage parlour where 'a lady may undertake to provide any additional service'. The website gives rates of £35 for twenty minutes or the bumper deal of, '30 minutes/2 girls: £80'. As Schofield wrote he ended up swinging in the Smithfield pub: ‘I played a game of table skittles for fifteen minutes and it didn't cost me anything. To my utter relief I won, it was a happy ending.’ And less messy than similar endings at Lounge 56.
Not a barSLEUTH SAYS WE’VE LOST IT
Speaking of beer Sleuth is shocked how new research from the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) shows the half pint glass is now the most popular way to drink beer. CAMRA say ‘this shows people are opting to drink less, but be more adventurous in their choices’. Sleuth says as a nation we’re losing our vigour - half pints, really? Although given the other CAMRA news this week maybe they have a point. Apparently there are now more than 11,000 varieties of real ale available in the UK – we have more breweries per head than anywhere else on Earth. Sleuth’s worked out it would take 30 years to sample one of those 11,000 beers per day, but it’ll only take five years if Sleuth samples six different beers per day. He’s starting now. Right away. There's not a moment to lose.
Day oneSLEUTH'S IRATE PHONE CALL OF THE WEEK...
Sleuth's colleague, David Blake, took a call from Transport for Greater Manchester this week, following the news that the firm contracted to deliver Manchester's troubled Oyster Card system had been binned. "We don't think you should use the term 'binned'," said the worried TfGM employee, "because the system hasn't been binned." "Ok but it's been shelved?" asked Blake. "Well, no we wouldn't say 'shelved' either," said the employee. "Well what would you use?" asked Blake. "We'd say it's being 'progressed'," said the employee. "'Progressed?" said Blake, mindful that it had been three years since the 'Get Me There' scheme was announced, costing a wedge of public money no doubt with next to sod all to show for it. "How about delayed? Postponed? Mothballed?" asked Blake. "We'd still rather 'progressed'," said the employee...
...SPEAKING OF METROLINK PROGRESS
There wasn't much of that happening on Friday morning at a sodden Trafford Bar. In fact, it was so wet that this Metrolink passenger slipped over, popped a hip, and had to film this on the side... (credit: Clare Freeman)
SLEUTH'S MOST MORRISSEY UNFRIENDLY MENU OF THE WEEK...
This award goes to nose-to-tail supper club, Face & Foot, who on Monday 14 September will be serving this menu at Bangers & Bacon in Spinningfields Kitchens:
- Raw liver and tomato shooter with lime, salt and tequila chaser.
- Lamb's kidneys in sherry served on crostini.
- Ox heart tartare slider server with chipped potatoes.
- Argentinian chicken heart taco with chimichurri and pico de gallo.
- Mexican inspired lamb's brain and avocado tacos with salsa and sour cream.
- Chocolate and blood, orange pot with crispy bacon biscuit.
Tickets are £20 and made from the tanned hides of baby rabbits.
Yummy - this menu is not a no-brainer
