Gabriel’s Grocery

This place is gone! Replaced by the post box! Which is even better! Same principle, amazing pancakes, great coffee, good staff. Find the proper review and read!

Gabriel’s Grocery served me and a friend well enough as a Saturday afternoon tea spot. A toasted and buttered teacake each plus one cup of tea came to a reasonable £4 something. Teacakes are a bit like hot cross buns, but without the cross and presumably available all year round! I am no expert, but my friend is and rated Gabriel’s teacakes as ‘slightly above average’. The teacakes came slightly burnt around the edges yet still not so crisp and indeed a bit flattened by the toasting & buttering process.
The staff here seemed quite friendly and well-​informed. We learnt that the teacakes are sourced from Barbakan of Chorlton. Alternatively, we could have had a scone or else an orange and poppyseed cake, the last of which is baked in-​house.
Gabriel’s certainly has a cute, villagely feel — as well as normal access from the street, there is an internal door between Gabriel’s and the Chorlton Post Office! Seating is comfortable at a mixture of benches and chairs. In characteristic Chorlton fashion, additional outdoor seating also available in front of the store. The small kitchen is semi-​open and manned by proper grown-​ups, which inspires my confidence on both counts! As well as offering a variety of light meals, Gabriel’s is also a deli. So you could mail a parcel, buy some stamps, a few sweet potatoes, lemons, fresh herbs, a couple of bottles of traditional lemonade then sit down to soup, tea & cake!
Cosy, small but beautifully-​proportioned sums up Gabriel’s. As I prefer tearooms to pubs, I would definitely pay this place another visit and indeed checkout other offerings from The Modern Caterer stable which also caters for Whitworth Gallery and Jodrell Bank.

Felicity S mentioned pancakes. Second time at Gabe’s, I was ravenous. I’d just been swimming. I had to try these pancakes. She described them as ‘fat and fluffy’. She noted lots of maple syrup. Could they live up to these expectations?
And THEN some. Gabriel’s do the absolute best pancakes I’ve ever eaten. They come with bacon as standard but with my meat aversion, I asked for them without. The chef came up while I was enjoying my coffee and asked if I’d like them topped with fruit instead, so I went for apples and sultanas. The whole dish was absolutely delicious. The pancakes are crisp and buttery on the outside, fluffy on the inside, melty and tender and simply yummy.
It’s going to be really hard to jump on the bus home at Wilbraham Road straight after swimming in the mornings with Gabe’s tempting me with its warm, bright red glow and sexy pancakes. Wow.

This gets 5 stars for my first ever visit, for breakfast this morning — because of some of the most incredible American-​style pancakes I’ve ever had… delicious, fat, fluffy, with loads of maple syrup and they were apparently extra big because I didn’t have any bacon — although they were happy to give me sultanas instead which is my must-​have with pancakes… all that for £5 including a delicious free coffee which you get before noon — amazing. I didn’t need to eat again until 9.30pm!
My friend had 2 very fresh boiled eggs with a huge pile of buttered Barbakan bread toast — which she really enjoyed. The lady doing the cooking — and service — was absolutely lovely, really nice and friendly. I’ve already told my friend we are definitely going back the next time I’m in Manchester…