An insider’s guide to eating and drinking in Altrincham

Rigatoni’s is a bustling 25-seater Southern Italian pasta kitchen at the top of Shaws Road in Altrincham. Their rotating blackboard menu combines both their deep-rooted southern Italian heritage and their own creativity. They say that their simple pledge is to put their hearts and minds into every plate they serve.

Spanish small plates and a menu that really delivers. Porta Altrincham might be another tapas place – but this one is a smash hit serving excellent food and fine wines.

Translating as ‘three chubby friends’ (a self-effacing reference to owner Francesco Scafuri and a pair of his portly pals from back in Campania), Tre Ciccio Altrincham doesn’t look much from the outside, or even the inside, at first.

California Coffee & Wine is a ray of SoCal sunshine. The Cal-Mex flavours served up are fresher and sharper than typical Tex-Mex offerings and everything feels clean and wholesome – if you give the sausage and bacon mega stack a swerve.

The food doesn’t take itself too seriously, it’s just there to be enjoyed. Expect dishes like San Fran salmon, all scrambled eggs and wilted spinach with some spectacular smoked fish from the Manchester Smokehouse or ranch beans with tortilla, smashed avocado, Cali salsa and plenty of zing from fresh chillies and spring onions.

Setting a precedent for the likes of Mackie Mayor and Stockport Produce Hall, many have hailed the revamping of the Market House Indoor Food Hall as the touch paper that lit Altrincham’s whole foodie scene ablaze.

Tiny and usually packed to the rafters of its converted terraced house, Yara is one of those hidden gems that the locals keep trying to get us to shut up about.

Starting life as a fun little pop-up, Libero is a football-themed craft ale bar which encourages its customers to don vintage footie shirts and cosy up for a beery, amiable bit of bonding.

WowYauChow is a ‘British Chinese’ from accountant turned restaurateur Henry Yau which has become a firm favourite in Alty. The food is east meets west: Chinese classics with a contemporary British slant, served as small plates to encourage sharing, tasting and hopefully less waste.

Given the much-publicised dangers of drinking too much booze, it takes a dark sense of humour to name your bar Mort Subite (meaning ‘sudden death’ in French).

‘Create, don’t curate’ is Blanchflower’s motto and to that end, much of their produce is made in-house.

As Nigel Slater once said, ‘No matter how bad things get, it’s impossible not to love someone who made you toast.’ So a cafe whose concept is ‘things on toast’ was always going to find a place in people’s hearts. The Toast Altrincham menu offers toast for breakfast, toast for lunch, and you guessed it, toast for… dessert.