Date of visit: Sunday 10th July, 2009
Refreshments consumed: 2 Cappuccinos, slice of chocolate cake
Price: £7.50
Reason for visit: General snoop around.
Comments: The Manchester City Art gallery cafe is housed in spacious, contemporary and fresh surroundings in the heart of Manchester’s financial district. They offer a wide range of home made sandwiches, cakes and (at lunchtimes only) hot food, in addition to the usual teas, coffees, cold drinks and snacks. We were too late to sample the hot food on this occasion, so settled for coffee and cake.
Firstly, the cake. While tasty, it was quite dry. My companion thought the icing was “too buttery”. I’m not a big cake expert (I was born without a sweet tooth, it seems) so I think I’ll just have to take her word for it.
Coffee, on the other hand, is something that I do know a lot about. Sadly, the coffee here suffered from the same illness that blights many a cafe. Namely, under-training of the barista. under extracted watery espresso (TAMP, damn it!), terrible microfoam (If I wanted to see bubbles I’d have a bath, thanks..), and far too large a serving size
(hence the need for a double shot). While I find this unacceptable, the vast majority of people (including those serving such monstrosities) are not aware of how espresso, and espress0 based drinks should be served. I blame the American chains that are scattered across the high street. Low quality, big serving sizes, diluted pish.
Manchester is crying out for decent espresso. I find it depressing.
Having said that, the cafe doesn’t profess to be an espresso bar, so I’ll try to be understanding. The staff were polite, the place was clean and it was an overall pleasant experience, if a little overpriced.
Score: 3/5
art&cake - food, art and coffee 