Mary-Ellen McTague is one of the driving forces behind Manchester’s modern food scene: a chef, restaurateur and community builder whose cooking is rooted in place, craft and proper hospitality. In this episode, she joins the go-to food podcast to talk about the city she helped shape, the dishes she can’t stop thinking about, and the hard-won lessons behind building restaurants that people genuinely love.

Her story runs from cooking for touring bands at Manchester’s Roadhouse as a student, to breaking barriers at the Michelin-starred Sharrow Bay Country House, and then into Heston Blumenthal’s inner circle at The Fat Duck. From the intensity and precision of a two-then-three-star kitchen to an R&D role exploring Britain’s food history at The Hind’s Head, Mary-Ellen’s career has been defined by curiosity, grit, and an obsession with flavour that actually means something.

Back home, she became synonymous with Manchester’s dining renaissance—opening trailblazing restaurants, earning national acclaim, and feeding not just thousands of happy punters, but (as the hosts proudly put it) well over 150,000 people across the city. She shares what it’s really like to build a “rotation” of ambitious young chefs in Manchester, why a dish like Lancashire hotpot can carry identity and memory, and how her love of simple, brilliant produce started with a life-changing stint in rural Provence.

The conversation also goes deeper: burnout, resilience, an ADHD diagnosis that “explained a lot,” and the purpose-led work of Eat Well MCR—turning surplus food and community energy into meals for people who need them most. Expect big laughs, kitchen war stories, and plenty of menu envy—especially when Mary-Ellen breaks down her PIP snack essentials and that signature hotpot (with oyster ketchup) that might just be the most “her” dish of all.

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