New on Confidential Guides: 40 places to eat and things to do

Bringing new life to Hale village is relaxed restaurant and bar Riva, which cleverly scoops up trade from morning till night with it’s catch-all menu of brunches, lunches, dinners and cocktails.

Swanley Meadows is a tipi wedding and events venue set in the beautiful Cheshire countryside. It’s fully licensed for weddings and civil ceremonies, and services take place in the open air under a 200-year old beech tree.

TexStyle is a new craft festival celebrating the delight of making and creating. The event is the first of its kind for Manchester, bringing independent creatives from all over the country to Manchester Central for a weekend of stitching, sewing and more.

Owned and managed by two friends from Naples – both excellent chefs – Vesuvio brings the flavours, techniques and passion of Southern Italian cooking to Worsley in a big way.

Nico Vanacore and Giuseppe Lombardo are quite a duo – between them they’ve built a reputation for offering some of the most varied and true-to-its-roots Neapolitan food to be found in Greater Manchester. Fans of Cicchetti Manchester might recognise Giuseppe’s cooking – he was head chef there before he left to open Vesuvio.

Almanac opened in summer 2025 and has early signs of building the same enviable reputation as chef-owner Luke Payne’s nearby success story, The Packhorse. But while the Packhorse is a country pub complete with roaring fires and Sunday roasts, Almanac is a sleek restaurant which takes its style inspiration from classic New York meets New Orleans brasseries and its culinary notes from historical British food writers Mrs Beeton and Elizabeth David.

Anason is a Turkish-Mediterranean cafe which is fast becoming a local favourite for breakfasts, brunches and lunches in Glossop. Situated on Norfolk Square, it’s got possibly the best location in town, and some would say the best coffee too, but we’ll let other people argue about that one.

Baan Phad Thai is a family-run restaurant which specialises in showcasing the cuisine of the Isaan region of North-East Thailand. The dishes are rustic and homely, giving an honest, authentic flavour of South East Asia.

Bar Shrimp is the third opening from the Higher Ground and Flawd team, a seafood bar with an emphasis on DJ nights, cocktails, and a menu designed for grazing rather than full-on dining. With moody lighting, a hip clientele, and a self-stated goal to create an ‘immersive sonic identity’, it’s a fashion-forward kind of place, and priced accordingly.  

Bavette in the Leeds suburbs wouldn’t be out of place in the heart of Lyon. Dishes are traditional French and could – and often do – come from the well-thumbed pages of Larousse Gastronomique. Despite being rooted in the culinary classics, Bavette is a modern bistro, light and airy with a relaxed atmosphere.

Bruco is a new Italian restaurant in Ancoats. It’s modern and airy but the warm colours and friendly staff make it seem comfortable and cosy. The relaxed menu includes small sharing plates and nibbly bits plus a short selection of well-executed main courses.

The food at Butter Bird is excellent – if you like chicken, and things cooked in chicken fat. A pleasant-looking restaurant with a buzzy atmosphere, it’s more than the sum of its parts (which is, essentially, lots of people eating rotisserie chicken).

The Carrs is a large, 70-acre park on the edge of Wilmslow that’s worthy of a day-trip even if you’re not a Cheshire native. From sledging to splashing about in the river, it’s a popular place in all seasons.

Chotto Matte brings more high-rise, high-glam energy to Manchester. With stunning city views and swish Nikkei cuisine, it’s a place to see and be seen with instagrammable small plates bedecked with tiny flowers and chic cocktails.

Cibo Gran Cafe in Wilmslow takes the ladies who lunch concept and swaps it for ladies who brunch. And anyone else who wants poached eggs and smoked salmon in upscale Cheshire surroundings.

Much-hyped Manchester opening from the Big Mamma Group, Circolo Popolare is Italian dining designed for the Instagram grid. Its big, extravagant dishes look great and if you order wisely, taste pretty good too.

The couple who own Cuthbert’s started their cake business by baking goodies for friends and family, before branching out to supply local markets and cafes. And although brekkie, brunch and lunch are all on the menu at their Mount Pleasant cafe, it’s still cakes and bakes that they’re best known for.

Once the Air and Space Gallery at the Science and Industry Museum, upper Campfield Market has been transformed into Department Campfield – a co-working and office space for tech and creative businesses.

Diggle Lock is a cafe located next to the Huddersfield Narrow Canal towpath, so as you’d imagine, both walkers and dogs are very welcome. Canines even have their own menu to choose from. The place is best known for its glorious brunches and french toast. If you have a very sweet tooth – sweet enough to make a dentist wince – you can even try the 10,000-calorie french toast challenge

If you’re not in the mood for the National Trust cafe at Dunham Massey, you have a locally-grown option here at The Dunham Barn. You can walk there in ten minutes or less from the house – and you’ll be rewarded with a rustic, independently-owned business serving homemade cakes, coffee, real ales and daytime staples such as sandwiches, soups and breakfasts, all done well.

Engine Social Dining serves up a delightful array of global small plates where Spanish boquerones rub up against masala cod with red curry lentils. It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to describe the menu as ambitious tapas; the Iberian influence is notable and there are few places doing such well-travelled dining anywhere in the North.

Ezra and Gil Liverpool is the third opening from this popular coffee and brunch spot. What makes this location stand out is its outdoor space – a perfect place for leisurely lattes and people watching.

The long-anticipated Glossop Market Hall reopened in November 2025 following a £7.3m redevelopment project. The market stalls have been replaced by a light, airy food hall featuring the kind of trend-leading restaurants and cafes you’d normally have to travel into Manchester to find.

With its Tudor-style facade and picturesque setting overlooking Chorlton Green, the Horse & Jockey has always had the potential to be one of Manchester’s most notable pubs. In 2025 (a mere 200 years since it first opened) it could finally be about to secure its place in that list.

Kallos Cafe & Wine Bar has lit up Salford’s dining scene like a thunderbolt from Zeus himself since it opened in March 2025. It already has a host of loyal locals who love both its easy-going Mediterranean brunches and superb coffee as well as its modern Greek meze dining and well-chosen wines.

Hidden underneath the railway arches between Red Bank and Dantzic Street, Kontrast sauna and ice bath cafe isn’t in the nicest part of town but they certainly know how to make the most of a tricky location.

I’ve never seen Libby’s Bread & Wine quiet. It probably never is, except, perhaps, when the bakers arrive at 5am to start making that day’s loaves and cakes. By mid-morning, it’s buzzing with chatter. Tables are filled as soon as they’re cleared, and even when the terrace overlooking the river Goyt is open, seats aren’t easy to come by.

Mollie’s Diner is the third instalment from the hip motel brand and the first in the North. Think Twin Peaks meets mid-century steakhouse where red vinyl booth seating is levelled up a notch with cushioned ox-blood leather. Diner tropes are played up to with bacon, egg and maple syrup waffles, double cheeseburgers and all-American apple pie.

The National Cycling Centre is the home of bike brilliance with elite competitors zooming round the velodrome. It was the UK’s first indoor Olympic-standard cycling track and hosted the cycling events at the Commonwealth Games in 2002. As well as a state-of-the-art velodrome, there’s an international-standard BMX arena with the only eight-metre electric start hill in the world.

Nell’s Media City is another outpost of the ever-expanding home-grown pizza empire. What sets it apart from the other Nell’s is the shuffleboard and karaoke.

Of course, it has everything we love about Nell’s too: pizzas the size of a UFO with a thin and crispy New York-style base; that double down pepperoni topping; ice cream sandwiches that are always a bit too frozen but nevertheless irresistible; and a top selection of beers and margs.

Quality wines, stunning small plates made from local, seasonal produce and an atmosphere that’s hard to replicate in city centre venues. No wonder Norman’s Neighbourhood Kitchen has just been awarded a Bib Gourmand in the 2026 round-up.

North Garden is a part of Liverpool’s culinary history. This family-run restaurant has been serving seriously addictive Cantonese dishes for well over 30 years.

Fans of hit restaurant 10 Tib Lane will be keen to check out Posie – a new smaller-scale venue from the same team. It’s more cocktail bar than restaurant but with a three-course menu of small plates, you won’t be left to fill up on olives and nuts if you turn up hungry.

Rock Over Climbing Sharston is the newest climbing centre from the respected Rock Over group – and it’s one of the friendliest, most colourful, and inclusive climbing spots around.

The centre offers a range of regularly-changing bouldering routes of all levels from very easy beginner routes which are graded as VB through to testing climbs of V7 and above.

The Royal Armouries Museum is definitely one to visit. A focus on weaponry may sound a bit dull, but this museum brings history to life in hands-on ways you’d never expect.

This attractive space will appeal to people who want a less corporate, more creative feel for their working day. Housed in a former textile warehouses on Princess Street, it’s on the ground floor next to the SEESAW cafe and the Korean kitchen RamYum.

Polish bakery Sticky Fingers now has a permanent cafe and shop on Stockport’s Great Underbank, as well as its Market Hall stall. Go for the coffee and walnut pastries, the banoffee danish, the house BLT and loaves of proper sourdough.

That’s Thai is a teeny hole-in-the-wall cafe next to a garage in Cheetham Hill. While it only has a small number of covers – plastic stools along the wall and some outdoor seating in the summer – it has enough fans and loyal customers to fill them all many times over. This place serves some of the best Thai food you’ll find anywhere in Manchester.

Wang’s Dumplings is a tiny place with a big reputation on TikTok and a reputation for some of the best dumplings and wontons in the city. It’s also an absolute bargain.

Winsome is a relatively new restaurant in Manchester but it already feels like an established part of the city’s dining scene. Perhaps that’s down to its timeless classic cooking or perhaps the pedigree of the team behind it. 

XF Manchester opened in January 2026 in a prime spot in the Arndale Centre. It’s the third UK opening for this German gym brand (Liverpool and Birmingham also have XF gyms), and although it’s early days at the time of writing, initial feedback is good.