Chopstix Manchester
Ian Jones, Food and Drink Editor
Summer 2024: Chopstix is hosting a huge event with thousands of pounds worth of free food on offer for those around the city centre Thursday 8th August.
Mancunians will have the chance to snag a free lunch as the brand introduces its brand-new ‘Flavour Craver’ offering. The Asian noodle chain is offering free food, including their signature meal boxes and crispy spring rolls, with hosts of games and activities on offer over the day and a ‘Wheel of Fortune’ with impressive prizes on offer.
Lucky winners can bag themselves some exclusive merchandise and fully stocked gift cards.
All of the action will be centred around Chopstix’s Piccadilly Station storefront. From 11 AM till 6 PM, the ‘Flavour Craver’ crew will be taking over, transforming the space with a live DJ, as well as free competitions for hungry Mancs to grab themselves some free food and prizes.
Venue profile: Chopstix is a noodle bar based on the approach to Piccadilly Station, with a great range of quick and easy Chinese dishes. It’s certainly not fine dining but the food on offer is good quality with a decent selection of dishes for those last-minute grab-and-go eating options. You can choose between rice and noodles for the base, both packed with vegetables and cooked well – pleasingly light on the oil.
But the toppings are where the real delight starts. There are around ten different choices, from pumpkin katsu curry to teriyaki beef, each fresh and sporting a well-made sauce, perfectly balanced and not too salty or too sweet. I opt for bbq chicken on the noodles and salt ‘n’ pepper chicken on the rice, as recommended by the assistant.
They’re both superb, delivering a hearty meal for the small box, and the website has the calories listed for each and every item, useful in these post-lockdown times when many of us have built up a Covid ‘coat’ out of boredom and comfort-eating.
They also sell a range of sauces as standalone items to use in your cooking at home. They’re all excellent, much easier than making your own from a dozen different ingredients and a damn sight better than the mainstream options on supermarket shelves. My tip? The Chinese BBQ sauce is original, delicious and worth buying a year’s supply.
The crispy chicken balls are another solid choice (although a little pot of sauce would have been handy) and ten mini duck spring rolls, which have a good crunch and a subtle five spice flavour. Chopstix might not set the world on fire for services to experimental cuisine, but they do offer superb quality Chinese fare at reasonable prices.
