Top 10 budget places to eat in Sheffield
This week Sheffield hosts its first major food festival.
To celebrate, Tony Naylor has been searching the Steel City for good
affordable grub. Here are 10 of the city's best budget bets
Wig & Pen ... a pleasant boozer that serves good modern British food
1. Blue Moon
Located in a one-time auction saleroom, this stalwart vegetarian cafe not only produces tasty food but does so in a seriously handsome space. Up among the ornate cornicing, a skylight floods the otherwise simple white room with light, making it - certainly on a sunny day - a very pleasant spot in which to linger over a coffee. No one will hurry you along; it's not that kind of place. The menu offers plenty of variety: soups; quesadilla and burritos; salads; the obligatory hommity pie, and daily specials like goulash and imam bayeldi, a dish of aubergines in a rich tomato sauce. Blue Moon's cakes are noteworthy, too. The chocolate and orange crunchie - with its biscuit pieces, sultanas and raisins, not unlike an adult Cadbury's Picnic - is dangerously good. They also stock locally-made Our Cow Molly ice-cream and a good selection of vegan wines and beers (including Pale Rider from celebrated Sheffield brewery Kelham Island, £3.45).• 2 St. James Street, +44 (0)114 276 3443. Snacks from around £2.15; mains meals with rice/ salad £6.05.
2. Fusion Organic Cafe
An impressive Grade II-listed former cutlery factory, the Butchers Works is now better known as the Academy of Makers,
an educational trust that utilises the skills of a resident community
of artist-makers and craftspeople. On-site, you will also find Fusion,
arguably Sheffield's best cafe, and itself a hive of making and baking
activity. Take your pick, at the counter, from bright-eyed salads and
good looking cakes; interesting quiches (courgette, onion and manchego);
soups; filled croissant and panini. Specials might include the likes of
grilled mackerel served with clam Provençale and Fusion's own homemade
garlic focaccia (£7.60), but make sure you try the potentially addictive
Moroccan lamb pasties (£2.70). The Brazilian biodynamic coffee is good,
strong and smooth. Fusion is right to be proud of it. Throw in some
bright, chatty and efficient staff, and you have a place that, not only
serves great food, but which gives off a very positive vibe. • 72 Arundel Street, +44 (0)114 252 5974; fusioncafe.co.uk. Snacks/ sandwiches from £1.20-£3.80; full meals around £7.
3. PJ Taste
Pre-packed salads and sandwiches are normally sad, drab things, but not at PJ Taste. Its chiller cabinet is alive with colour and interesting lunch options. The emphasis is very much on local and regional ingredients, like Yorkshire Crisps, Round Green Farm venison and Coppice House Farm dry-cured bacon, and PJ's pre-packed range is augmented by a short menu of hot specials like steak ciabatta and an organic three-bean burger. If you have time, there is limited seating where you can linger over the PJ ploughman's (£6.25), with its Mrs Bell's blue and mature Wensleydale cheeses (eat-in only). As well as running this sandwich shop-cafe, PJ Taste also makes a range of fruit and herb drinks, Citrus Hits (£1.75).• 249 Glossop Road, +44 (0)114 275 5971; pjtaste.co.uk. Sandwiches from £1.95-£3.75 (takeaway).
4. Spice Market Cafe
Described, in the 2010 Good Food Guide, as "Sheffield's favourite
restaurateur", Richard Smith's BrewKitchen group is certainly driving-up
standards in the city. Canteen (32-44 Sandygate Road, Crosspool, +44
(0)114 266 6096), a budget spin-off above his marquee venue, Artisan, is
universally acclaimed by local foodies. There you can eat mains like
minced beef plate pie, mustard mash and ale gravy for £8. The only draw
back is that it's out in Crosspool, an £8-10 taxi ride from central
Sheffield. Smith's Spice Market Cafe is more accessible to the busy
visitor. Located on trendy, studenty Ecclesall Road, the cafe is a
curious cross-pollination of Asian and Western influences. It toggles
between fusion and confusion. While all the constituent components -
good minted mushy peas; skin-on fries liberally scattered with chilli
flakes; a strident Asian coleslaw; interesting, lightly battered "Indian
fish fingers" - are sound, the "naanwich" naan bread sandwich platter
doesn't work, conceptually. Tartare sauce, a mini Caesar salad and a
sweet, jammy chilli dip have no place on the same plate together. SMC's
lunchtime take on the bento box and its platters (with a beer/wine, £10)
should make more sense. • 371-373 Ecclesall Road, +44 (0)114 2665541; relaxeatanddrink.com. Lunch naanwich, £6; bento box/ platters, with drink, £10. Evening mains £7.00-£16.
5. Wig & Pen
A pleasant boozer fully on-board with the modern British food ethos, the Wig & Pen menu includes a number of small plates - oxtail faggots with rocket and pickled onions - salads and cheaper mains, like pork and chive sausage 'n' mash, £7.50, that fall within a £10-a-head budget. On "Wig Wednesdays" you can pick up one of its handmade pies, served with mash, vegetables and gravy, plus a drink, for £9.50. The people behind the Wig & Pen also run Platillos (unit 4, Leopold Square, +44 (0)114 276 3141; platillos.co.uk), a well-regarded tapas restaurant, which, at lunch, does two matched tapas – for example, chicken tagine with spiced cous cous - for £6.• Paradise Square, The Cathedral Quarter, +44 (0)114 276 3988; wigandpensheffield.com. Small plates around £5; mains from £7.50.
6. Nonna's Cucina
The deli arm of the Nonna's operation (you'll find a cafe-bar and the
restaurant next door), the Cucina sells humungous sandwiches, pizza
slices, takeaway coffees and fantastic cakes - try the lemon polenta
(£2.25). The sandwiches, served on their own fresh breads, utilise good
quality Italian produce, such as fennel-spiked finocchiona salami and
asiago cheese; or speck, taleggio and balsamic onions, the latter very
much a sandwich for those who like punchy flavours. There are a couple
of benches outside the shop where you can perch in the afternoon sun,
but if you've bought a picnic haul, head to the nearby botanical gardens
(entrance, Thompson Road, off Ecclesall Road). • 7-9 Hickmott Road, +44 (0)114 268 6110; nonnas.co.uk. Pizza slices £2.50; sandwiches £3.75.
7. Green Steps
A spin-off from what many regard as Sheffield's best chippy, Two Steps (249 Sharrow Vale Road, +44 (0)114 266 5694), this place offers a more progressive, touchy-feely take on fish 'n' chips. That means: sustainable fish, gluten-free batter and plenty of vegetarian options. The Guardian opts for "panga", a farmed, fresh water fish with dense flesh, rather like a thicker lemon sole. The fish isn't fried-to-order and, consequently, the interior of the batter is ever so slightly soggy in the fillet's thick mid-section, where it's been resting on its own weight. That, though, is a minor criticism. The batter is otherwise light and golden, the fish has been accurately cooked, and the chips are proper, fluffy thick-cut numbers, with a good mixture of crispness and slight caramelised chew to the exterior. You get a huge portion for your money, too.• 22 Hickmott Road, +44 (0)114 266 8388. Fish 'n' chips, £4.30.
8. The Wick At Both Ends
This music-led pub and DJ bar, on the fringes of the trendy
Devonshire Street drag, may be somewhere you can burn the candle at both
ends, but it also offers a restorative food menu and, even, a so-called
Pipe & Slippers Sunday for those struggling with a "poorly head"
(Sunday roast, £6.95). Pies, sausages and such made on-site and the
kitchen is clearly keen to show a little creative flair. The chicken
"burger", for instance, is a fillet marinated in garlic, lemon, thyme
and that iconic Sheffield condiment, Henderson's Relish. Such
imagination and conscientious industry lifts a menu of classics, such as
mussels in cider and fish 'n' chips. A "light bite" of smoked mackerel
and bacon cakes is well-executed, the cakes substantive, the filling
quality, the flavours clear, and the accompanying leaves given a good,
spiky dressing. • 149-151 West Street, +44 (0)114 272 3039. Light bites from £3.50; mains from £5.50.
9. Gusto Italiano
There will be those who bridle at paying £4.95 for a panini, never mind £8.95 for a plate of meatballs. What, they may ask, is this upmarket cafe doing in a budget travel guide? It's here because, while it may not be cheap per se, it is good value. A couple of quid saved elsewhere, for food a fraction of this quality, would be a false economy. Lesser-spotted panini fillings - like fennel sausage and sauteed spinach; or bresaola, shaved parmesan and courgette - are indicative of an operation which, in its simple, patient treatment of good quality ingredients, is committed to offering an authentic Italian experience. Certainly, those polpette - ethereally light meatballs in a sensational, loosely pulped, almost blood red tomato sauce, served with good homemade focaccia - offer a little taste of Milan or Florence, just off Fargate.• 18 Church Street, +44 (0)114 275 1117. Panini from £4.95; hot dishes from £6.95.
10. Clearly Food Kitchen
Convenient for visitors - it's two minutes walk from Sheffield train
station - Stuart Baker's takeaway-cafe is also much-loved, locally. It
is cheap and unpretentious, yet founded on sound principles:
scratch-cooking, home-baking, seasonal, local ingredients. Its
casseroles and hotpots – say, braised beef with herb dumplings - are,
perhaps, the stars of a menu that includes soups and salads, hot and
cold sandwiches, pizza slices and decent cakes. Given the enthusiasm
with which local foodies talk about CFK, however, it has to be said that
the breakfast Cumberland ring bap, sampled by the Guardian, was merely
OK. The sausage was a fairly standard banger, the barm (which could have
been a touch fresher) arrived without butter, and, even at £2.79, it
tasted a bit flat and functional. • 46 Howard Street, +44 (0)114 2700101; clearlyfoodkitchen.co.uk. Breakfast from £1.29; lunch from £2.29.
• Sheffield Food Festival, 1-6 June, see sheffieldfoodfestival.com
Article Source: http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2010/jun/02/sheffield-top-10-budget-food
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