The Smartblend Guide

To where to eat and drink in Manchester

The Smartblend guide is your go-to for where to eat and drink in Manchester. It’s all about celebrating Manchester’s thriving Bars and Restaurants - A city proudly boasting hundreds of different places to eat and drink, with variety to spare and an abundance of innovation.

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How it works

The Smartblend guide rating system scores Manchester’s bars and restaurants out of 50 Points. Which are split into 5 sections, each section has a maximum of 10 points.

Anyone can contribute to Smartblend score for Manchester bars and restaurants, as long as they follow the rules of reviewing found below. Every new review gets added to the overall score as an average. For example: If a restaurant is currently scoring a 7 for food and you rate it a 8, it will bump the overall score up to 7.5

The Smartblend guide rating system has been developed to help guide you into visiting the place that suits you most. Simple scroll through or use the location navigator to help narrow down your search.

Two things to remember…

Firstly, each review gets added and calculated as an average. This means that the highest score a bar or restaurant can achieve is 50. Meaning it’s all about the quality of a review and not quantity. Too many great independent bars and restaurants struggle to get seen on review sites because big companies use big marketing budgets to manipulate review sites so they look like “the best”

Secondly, this is designed as a guide to help you decide the best place for YOU. The rating system which is explained in more detail below is designed to find the things most important to you. Whether its good food you want, good views or good drinks. Because of this, it means if a bar or restaurants ranks low for one section it doesn’t impact the quality of the venue, due to the fact they might rank high on other factors.

To many times review sites have turned into weapons for distorting a bar or restaurants reputation. We have all seen a small independents pour all their passion and time into perfecting a dining experience, just to have some old fart turn around with the “I booked a table for 8pm, its now 8.05 and you still haven’t seated me! i’m going to give you a 1 star TripAdvisor review!” Or 1 Star reviews on a restaurant they haven’t even been to because they had trouble booking. I mean come on?! How do you rate a restaurant badly when you haven’t even ate there food??? Anyway… That’s not what this is about

The Smartblend rating system explained

FOOD

The food rating is based on constancy, taste, look and innovation.

DRINK

Drinks are rated on constancy, taste, look and innovation. All apply to cocktails, wines, No ABV and pretty much any other drink menu the venue has.

AMBIENCE

Ambience is all about the vibe, the environment and the interior. Ratings are based on everything from how close the tables are, how it smells and the views, all the way to the toilets and music.

CUSTOMER SERVICE

Customer service is based on the friendliness and accommodating attitude of the staff. How welcomed do you feel?

VALUE £

Value is all about the money. This isn’t about if it’s cheap it gets a 10 and if it’s expensive it gets a 1. It’s all about the value you get for what you spend. Does the cost make sense?

Rules of reviewing

Don’t rate a restaurant or bar a zero in everything just because you didn’t like the customer service. That has nothing to do with how good the food or drinks are.
Don’t review a place you work in or your best mate works in.
All reviews are reviewed before being added to the average score to wean out any petty or fake reviews.
If you score a restaurant or bar 10 or 0 points to any section, you must add a note to explain why.

How it works

Once you submit your review it will be added within 24 hours worked out as an average. This means the highest review a bar or restaurant can achieve is 50.
You may also add a review note if there is something you would like to say about the bar or restaurant.
You can use the “Narrow your search” button to narrow your search to a specific area