Manchester Blog: 2018

REVIEW : Bella Italia Piccadilly Gardens

Bella Italia is a well known Italian restaurant and its creators have been in the restaurant industry for more than 25 years. They traditionally serve Italian dishes and really bring them to life by sourcing their ingredients directly from Italian family producers and more of where their ingredients are sourced can be seen on their website. The dishes served are all based on the creations of Italian chef, Vittorio Lettieri, who grew up in Southern Italy. Bella Italia are ultimately a sit down restaurant but also offer a takeaway option which is great news when working in the city centre. In addition to expanding to the takeaway option, Bella Italia now also have a home range in local supermarkets such as Tesco, where you can purchase their readymade popular dishes and desserts.

I’ve been to Bella Italia in Piccadilly Gardens Manchester a few times and have not only eaten inside of the restaurant but have also had their takeaway option. When ordering takeaway from Bella Italia, I have never actually ordered online or via Deliveroo, Uber Eats or Just Eat, I’ve always popped into the restaurant and ordered directly, which is ideal if you are not sure what you want to eat. With more and more Bella Italia restaurants popping up around the UK, I thought now would be a great time to check out the takeaway option again and give my honest review.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

After talking about pasta and Italian food most of the morning with my work colleagues, I decided Bella Italia would be the perfect option for lunch. I took a short walk across Piccadilly Gardens in Manchester and popped into Bella Italia to place my lunchtime order. The restaurant is placed in the heart of Piccadilly Gardens, facing the water fountains, close by to the local banks, shops and other places to eat and most importantly about a 2 minute walk from the office.

As soon as I walked into the restaurant I was met by a member of staff who raised his hand in the air from across the room to suggest to wait ‘two minutes’.. I stood at the doorway and waited over five minutes with my friend before I was finally given the takeaway menu to browse through before placing my order. I decided to order the Traditional Lasagne (£10.99) which consisted of layers of pasta, fine minced beef ragù, béchamel sauce and a mozzarella cheese. After not being able to order 2-3 options from the menu as the takeaway menu was out of date and had not been updated, my friend settled on the Sicilian Pollo Rosso (£11.39), which consisted of pasta with roast chicken, onion, red peppers and pachino tomatoes, finished with a Sicilian red pesto sauce.

Overall, the takeaway menu is an extensive menu which has plenty of options that you can order as a take out. You can view all menus online but unfortunately they did say that the takeaway menu has not been updated and that some options listed were no longer available. Once I did place my order, I was offered to take a seat in the restaurant area and was informed it would take around 10 minutes for my food to be prepared and ready to takeaway. It was not long at all from placing my order to actually receiving my food and it did actually arrive in less than 10 minutes, which is great and very convenient for a quick lunchtime collection. It was just a shame that the menu was out of date and a shame about the service when I first entered the restaurant!

TASTE

The lasagne was tasty and I enjoyed the meaty taste of the mince beef and the hint of herbs hidden in the beef and lasagne. The béchamel sauce and mozzarella cheese complimented the dish and overall I would consider it to be a nice lasagne. Unfortunately I wouldn’t consider the lasagne on this occasion to be anything special or anything really to ‘talk about’ as it wasn’t very hot and in fact only just lukewarm. There wasn’t a lot of mozzarella cheese and the portion was quite small considering the price of a straight forward dish. My friend also commented on the fact that her food wasn’t very warm but did enjoy the taste of her Sicilian Pollo Rosso.

COST AND VALUE

My Traditional Lasagne cost £10.99 and the Sicilian Pollo Rosso cost £11.39. The portion of my lasagne was quite small when considering the price of the food and there was very little mince or mozzarella cheese. I was also very disappointed with how the food was presented and felt like it was thrown together. You can see from the images taken as to how the food was presented and that half of the bowl was pretty much empty or simply just a thin layer of pasta. My friends Pollo Rosso on the other hand was a bigger portion and was presented nicely.

Taking into account the portion size of my lasagne and how the food was presented, coupled up with the food only being lukewarm, I unfortunately would not consider this to be very good value for money. I would actually consider my lasagne option to be an expensive meal as there was simply just a thin layer of pasta (I would even suggest just one layer), a little bit of mince beef with a sprinkle of cheese and sauce.. it was disappointing!

OVERALL

I was really looking forward to tucking into my Traditional Lasagne and liked the fact that a takeaway option was now available at a predominantly sit down restaurant chain. The welcoming from the member of staff and service when I first entered the restaurant really set the tone for my meal and on reflection was actually a little rude. I would however give brownie points for how quick the food was prepared and ready for taking away from placing my order but was very disappointed with the food in general.

It’s great that Bella Italia serve their takeaway food in a disposable and recyclable dish with cutlery that can also be recycled but was let down with the actual portion size, the presentation of the food and the actual lack of mince beef, pasta layers and mozzarella cheese. I’m pretty sure a lasagne has more than one layer of pasta and has a little more mince beef.. please please please bring out the true Italian taste in your lasagne Bella Italia!

Overall, I would consider my Bella Italia takeaway to be average and wasn’t really impressed. Based on my takeaway Traditional Lasagne, I would not return back to The Piccadilly Gardens restaurant but may one day consider giving another Bella Italia restaurant a try. I definitely will not be rushing back anytime soon though.

PROS AND CONS

Pros

Quick once ordered
Packaging and cutlery recyclable
Tasty (although very little portion)

Cons

Takeaway menu not updated
Presentation
Expensive (for what I ordered)
Food not very hot
Service - staff uninterested

FOODIE RATING

I give Bella Italia Takeaway in Piccadilly Gardens, Manchester a Foodie Rating of 2/5. It would have been a much higher score if they’d have had better service and if the staff would have taken an interest and had not been a little rude. My rating would also be higher if the food was hot and if the food was more presentable. It also didn’t help not having an up to date takeaway menu.

Want to know more about Bella Italia? You can check out their website here: bellaitalia.co.uk

Have you been to Bella Italia? Have you tried the takeaway option? Let me know in the comments below.

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Beauty

REVIEW : Olay Daily Facials

I was recently asked to become an Olay Ambassador and was given the opportunity to try out and review Olay’s new facial wipes.. Olay Daily Facials 5-in 1 Dry Cloths. After being picked to team up with Olay, I was super excited for the facial wipes to arrive and to try them out and put them to the test. As a user of facial wipes as part of my daily routine (as well as cleanser, toner and moisturiser) I hope that I can give a useful review on Olay’s new wipes before you take the plunge and buy them from your local store. If there are any questions that you would like to ask after reading my review, let me know in the comments below.

Most people, if not everybody, are aware of Olay as a brand. Since 1952, Olay have been creating and producing beauty products, expanding their brand world wide and winning hundreds of beauty awards. Olay’s aim today is to build on their understanding of developing ground breaking beauty products that actually work and make a difference to your skin and the aging of your skin.

As somebody that uses beauty products on a daily basis and as somebody that has incorporated different products into my daily routine, I am not usually a huge user of Olay as a brand. I have used Olay products in the past but have never actually used their products on a daily or regular basis. I was therefore excited to give Olay Daily Facials a chance and let you guys know my honest opinion.

WHAT ARE OLAY DAILY FACIAL WIPES?

Olay Daily Facial Wipes are similar to your ‘everyday’ facial wipe with a slight ‘twist’. To start with the Olay Daily Facials are packaged in a neat little box with the clear Olay branding. The box contains 30 dry wipes which are activated by adding water. They are textured with tiny soft pockets to remove impurities, dirt and grime. Olay refers to their facial wipes as a mini facial spa, designed to leave your face feeling soft, clean and hydrated.

They have designed their facial wipes to act as a cleanser, toner, exfoliator, hydrator and makeup remover all in one cloth (5-in 1 Dry Clothes), which are infused with grapeseed extract. They are designed to carry out the following in one use;

Remove makeup
Cleanse away dirt, oil and impurities
Exfoliate like a gentle scrub
Improve the look of your skin
Preserve moisture and leave your skin feeling soft and conditioned

They are soap free and have been dermatologically tested.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

I really enjoyed using Olay’s 5-in-1 Daily Facial Wipes and I liked the fact that they are so easy and simple to use. It’s also great that you can carry them anywhere with you, whether that’s popping one into your bag to work, at the gym, when going away for a short weekend.. whatever the occasion, the wipe will not dry out like your usual wet facial wipes. The conveniency of them is great.

I like the idea of the wipes being a dry wipe which are activated when they come into contact with water. When the water activates the wipe, it then becomes very soft, smooth and has a soapy feel.. yet not too ‘soapy’.. just enough product to remove your make up and to give your face the cleanse that it needs. It also smells amazing and is not too overpowering.

Olay also offer their 5-in-1 Daily Facial Wipes for normal and sensitive skin.

COST AND VALUE

The cost of the facial wipes are usually £6.99 unless on special offer. At first I thought that this was quiet expensive for a pack of facial wipes but when you consider that there is 30 wipes in a pack and each wipe costs around 23p each.. it doesn’t seem so expensive. It’s basically works out about the same cost as other leading facial wipes. If you also only use one facial wipe per day then they are guaranteed to last an entire month and they also don’t dry out like wet facial wipes.

OVERALL

I’m impressed with Olay’s Daily Facials and they really do leave my skin feeling smooth, soft and makeup free. I did however have trouble removing all of my eyeliner and found that I had to keep rubbing over my eyes to eventually remove all of the eyeliner. This took a little compared to other branded facial wipes. However, they smell amazing and I would definitely use them again the the future. I love the conveniency of them and enjoyed the fact that it left my skin feeling like I’ve had a mini facial spa.

PROS:

Leaves skin feeling smooth, fresh and hydrated
Smells lovely
Dermatologically tested

CONS:

Price - slightly more expensive than alternative facial wipes
Struggled to remove stubborn mascara

BEAUTY RATING

I give Olay Daily Facials a Beauty Rating of 4/5. The wipes are so easy and convenient to use and do generally feel like they give your face a mini facial. If it wasn’t for the struggle of the removal of mascara it would have been a rating of 5/5.

Disclosure: I was given Olay Daily Facials 5-in 1 in exchange for my review and honest opinion. All views and opinions are my own.

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Food

REVIEW : Frankies Toasties Manchester

Toasties.. a plain cheese toastie, a cheese and ham toastie.. whichever your filling, toasties are seen as a comfort food, a retro choice of food to some people and were a huge rave at one time when toastie machines were flying off the shop shelves and our parents were in the kitchen clamping down two slices of bread with our favourite go to toastie fillings! Everybody loves a toastie.. and now there is a restaurant right on my door step in Manchester City Centre which sells toasties.. they literally offer almost any filling that you can think of.

Salford born Barry Chui is the owner of Frankie’s Toasties and came up with the idea of a toastie shop whilst sat at home one night, rading the cupboards for something to eat and with only a few items left in the cupboard and fridge.. created the start of his toastie idea. Since then, Barry’s dream was to bring back his childhood memory and open the first toastie shop and now his dreams and unique toastie concoctions are out there for all of us to try.

Frankie’s Toasties currently offer 32 different toastie fillings which are around £3 to £4 each. They also have a ‘selfieccino’ coffee machine where you can have your favourite photo printed onto your frothy coffee and are a busy little toastie shop based on Portland Street. They opened their doors for the first time on the 22nd October 2018 and I can already see these guys being a huge hit in Manchester City Centre. They have already had people queuing up outside of their doors every day for the last week and a half, eager to try one of their delicious and quirky toastie creations.

Credit: Instagram - Frankie’s Toasties
[all post images]

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

I made my way to Frankie’s the first week that they opened and I luckily got in line before the que started forming outside of the doors onto Portland Street. When first entering the toastie shop I found it to be clean, inviting and very unique. On one wall sat proudly was Frankie’s logo which is already becoming well known and a small area with a few tables and chairs for eating in. The other wall consisted of translated Mancunian phrases, which was great to see, especially as I visited with my friend who is originally from the South, she found it fascinating!

Displayed above the counter area is the menu of toasties avaliable, there are plenty to choose from and even some fillings you would have never of thought of but actually sound quite tasty! I ordered the Cheesy Bacon (£3.50) which consisted of a toastie filled with cheddar and mozzarella cheese and streaky bacon. I also ordered the Jelly Nut (£3.00) which was filled with crunchy peanut butter and strawberry jam. My friend ordered the Cheap ‘n’ Cheeseful (£3), a straight forward cheese toastie filled with cheddar and mozzarella cheese. She also ordered the Apple and Custard (£3.50) which consisted of an apple pie filling with custard and had a sugar and cinnamon dusting.

Once I had placed my order, I was given a receipt with a number on and invited to wait to the side until my order was ready. Once your chosen toastie is ready then your order number is shouted and you can move to the front to collect it.

It was great that you could see the toasties being made behind the counter and could see that it was freshly made.. you can also see the mountains of bread that is packed away ready to be used and I really liked the fact that they do not use a cheap bread, you can see they use a well known brand of bread which looked fresh and you are given the option of white or brown bread.

As you can imagine there was quite a few people stood waiting in the middle of the room (around 10-15 people) waiting for their toasties to be made to order and although the toasties were generally made as quick as humanly possible (you could see the staff in the background working none stop), the only downfall was that I had to wait 10 minutes between getting my cheesy bacon toastie and then my jelly nut toastie.. this was the same for my friend and a few others on the day which I visited.

Apart from the wait after placing my order, I couldn’t really fault Frankie’s Toasties. The staff were all very friendly and the place has a really great vibe about it.

TASTE

As a lover of toasties in general I really enjoyed both of my toastie creations. The filling of my Cheesy Bacon was delicious and you could taste the individual flavours of the cheddar, mozzarella and bacon. It took me back to my childhood when my mum would make me a toastie with the toastie machines that everybody used to have and that we probably all still do have stored in a cupboard somewhere. The Jelly Nut toastie was also delicious, again I could taste the peanut butter and the hot jam separately but then combined together with each bite of my toastie.. it was sweet, delicious and messy.. great choice for when you have a sweet tooth! My friend also enjoyed her Cheap ‘n’ Cheeseful toastie and could not stop speaking about the Apple Pie and Custard, which tasted exactly like the desert.. except on a toastie.

If you’re keen to take a sneaky look at the menu before heading down you can check their menu out via their website below, where you’ll see a huge range toasties to choose from and which include the Manc Melt (cheddar and mozzarella cheese, tuna, sweetcorn and mayo), the Salford Supernoodle Buttie (chicken flavoured noodle toastie) or even the Chocolate Bar Toastie (your favourite chocolate bar on a toastie). It seems that there is literally anything you can put on a toastie!

COST AND VALUE

Prices are around £3 to £4 each toastie. The prices vary depending on your chosen filling and there are a huge range of fillings available. I think the cost is slightly expensive when you consider that it is two pieces of bread with a filling of your choice. Although I haven’t found any other dedicated toastie shop in Manchester City Centre, there are local cafes where you can order a toastie for around the same price and which has a lot more filling packed into the toastie.

The toastie itself is a little small and compact but as Frankie’s make their toasties on a toastie machine, I imagine that there is only so much filling they can use.

I would however definitely return back to Frankie’s as my toastie was delicious and I really would like to try out their other creative fillings!

OVERALL

Frankie’s Toasties has a great buzz and feeling about the place. There are plenty of toastie fillings to choose from and my toastie choices were delicious. Although the que was forming outside of the door, it wasn’t too long until my order was taken, which was pretty impressive. The staff were all friendly, very welcoming and really work hard. The only downfall was that the toasties were a little on the small side and the waiting time between getting both of my toasties was a little too long. I understand they have only been trading for what was less than a week when I visited and I’m sure they’ll have this fixed in no time.

Overall, I would visit Frankie’s Toasties again and cannot wait to try out another one of their unique but delicious concoctions.. Chocolate Bar Toastie anybody?!

PROS AND CONS

Pros

Freshly made and tastes delicious
Unique and quirky concept
Happy and helpful staff
Wide range of fillings
Great decor ideas

Cons

Items ordered made at different times
Toasties on the small side

FOODIE RATING

I give Frankie’s Toasties FoodieRating of 4/5. It would have been a solid 5/5 Foodie Rating if it wasn’t for the toasties arriving separately and being a little on the small side but they’ve only been open a few days. I’m sure next time I visit it will be a 5/5. Definitely recommend giving Frankie’s a visit.

Want to know more about Frankie’s Toasties? They are a huge hit on Instagram or you can head over to their website here: FrankiesToasties

Are toasties a hit with you? What would be your favourite toastie filling? Let me know in the comments below.

Keep posted by following on social media:

Twitter | Instagram | Bloglovin

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Food

REVIEW : My Cookie Dough Manchester

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Other

The Shambles York

This isn’t a long blog post but just a quick update as to what I’ve been up to recently!

Unfortunately my blog and Twitter are not apart of my full time job and I very rarely get time off from where I actually work. The very rare occasion where I did have a few days off work was a few weeks ago and I took the opportunity to travel to and spend the day in York. The weather was lovely, it was part of my mums long birthday weekend and overall it was a lovely day out and if you're a Harry Potter fan.. which most of my family are.. then York is a must see place for you to visit.

Tucked away in a side street of York is an 'oldie worldie' street known as 'The Shambles'. It has won awards for its picturesque views and it known as one of the best preserved medieval streets, where many of the buildings date back to the late fourteenth and fifteenth Century. Before The Shambles became more of a destination for tourists, it was originally a street where local butchers used to gather and sell their cuts of meat to the locals. Some of the buildings also had slaughterhouses at the back and you can still see some of the hooks where they would display and hang their meats to sell.

The street itself is a very narrow street, with cobbles and little shops on either side. The Shambles is one of the UK’s most popular visited streets which attracts tourists, shoppers and a quite a lot of school trips and now consists of souvenir shops, cafes, a bakery and a few Harry Potter themed shops. There is also an all year round Christmas shop! There is also a local market, street performers and little cafes, bars, shops and eateries close by.

Overall, I had a really nice day and the weather was amazing. It was very busy as it was nearing the end of the school summer holidays but I would definitely recommend a visit to The Shambles, or even to York itself. It’s a really nice place and a great family day out.

Have you been to York? Have you visited The Shambles? What did you think? Let me know in the comments below.

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Competition

MUGGED OFF - GIVEAWAY

Raise your hand if you think last year flew by.. it literally whizzed by me and Christmas and New Year came and went within seconds. At the start of this year, I published a mini 2018 goals post which you can read here and as part of my goals for this year I want to not only work on posting more content to my blog but I also want to try and do a few giveaways. So it’s the beginning of January, people are hating being back at school, work and generally have the winter blues.. I thought now would be the perfect time to run a little giveaway on my blog.. everybody loves a mug right?!

I was kindly given a selection of goodies from Scribbler and thought it would be a great idea to pass some of their generosity onto one of my followers. Firstly though I would like to tell you a little bit about Scribbler and what they do.

Scribbler offers a large range of personalised cards, stationary and gifts that you can order online or purchase from your nearest Scribbler store. The cards they have to offer cover one of the largest ranges I’ve seen online and the range that they offer is unique, innovative and bang on trend. There are some really funny cards and gifts available on the website (see the photo above and you will understand the humour Scribbler brings). I definitely recommend giving their website a look by clicking here.

Anyway let’s cut to the chase.. I want to give this lovely (but funny!) mug to one of my followers. If any of you mugs would like to enter my giveaway, it's easy peasy. There are a few terms and conditions at the bottom of this blog post which you should read but other than that it's simple... the winner will be picked at random and the mug in the picture above will be posted out.

To enter this giveaway you must:
1. Be following on at least one of the following - Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or BlogLovin'.
2. This giveaway is open to the UK only.
3. The mug will be posted out as secure as possible but any damage in transit will not be my fault.
4. Giveaway will run for 3 weeks from 13th January 2018 until 3rd February 2018.
5. The winner of the giveaway will be picked randomly by Rafflecopter.
6. Winner to be emailed. If no reply within 48 hours than another winner will be chosen at random.

You can enter the giveaway below using Rafflecopter:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck and keep an eye out for future giveaways!

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Tech

Change Your Settings On Twitter To Help Blind People

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Manchester Blog

REVIEW : Bella Italia Piccadilly Gardens

REVIEW : Olay Daily Facials

REVIEW : Frankies Toasties Manchester

REVIEW : My Cookie Dough Manchester

The Shambles York

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