Cantaloupe: Stockport's new neighbourhood restaurant and wine bar
What's on the menu and what's the vibe?
This week, a stylish new wine bar and restaurant called Cantaloupe opened in Stockport and I was one of the first in line to try it.
I’ve been following the careers of Cantaloupe chefs Joshua Reed-Cooper and Mike Thomas for several years. Back in 2020, I interviewed Josh and his then co-pilot James Lord about their astonishingly good pop-up kitchen Tine at Blossom Street Social. The chefs had worked together at NQ restaurant Wilderness (now the rebranded - and worlds apart - Wolf At The Door) which I reviewed as a fledgling restaurant critic when it first opened in 2019.
Josh had previously done stints at massive Manchester success stories like Where The Light Gets In, The French (where he started on pot wash) and Mana. Cantaloupe’s Mike Thomas has also worked at Where The Light Gets In and was head chef at The Creameries, where I had one of the best Christmas feasts I have ever eaten. Perhaps somewhat overshadowed by Mary-Ellen McTague’s (rightful) chef stardom, Mike emerged with a project of his own called Campania at The Creameries - Sophie, my pasta correspondent at the time adored it. Later, the pair worked together at the short-lived Stock Market Grill.
But the dream of having their very own restaurant has been their North Star the whole time and now, in Cantaloupe, it’s a reality.
Where is Cantaloupe and what is it like inside?
Google Maps takes us the standard back street route to Cantaloupe but it’s easy to find, just off the main Little Underbank drag where all the lively bars and cool shops are, behind the shopping centre and opposite a grand old building which looks derelict. Someone on a cherry picker rolls past the window as we sip our first glass of wine. The signage is minimal, just a window decal for now. If ‘blink and you’ll miss it’ is your aesthetic, you’ll be well into this. But I suspect word is going to get around pretty fast.
Cantaloupe has moved into two units formerly a vape shop and a greasy spoon caff. Decor is coolly minimal with whitewashed walls, white tiles and wooden furniture. It sits around 30 guests at capacity - including bar stools at the window where we sat - and there is what I suppose you could call an open kitchen in the back room which doesn’t look much bigger than the one at Flawd.
Service is friendly and personal led by Dylan Tiernan who was previously at Climat. The team are lovely and seem to be really getting behind the concept. While it’s still very much early days for them, they knew the menu and the wines well already and made helpful recommendations.
What’s on the wine menu at Cantaloupe?
The food menu is short - my favourite approach - and several dishes are either crossed out as finished already or get crossed out during our time there.
That’s partly our fault for taking our time with the wine list before even looking at the food menu. The wine list is a double-sided A4 list of mostly European wines with five each of reds and whites by the glass that I presume will rotate to new ones regularly. The wine prices range from £40ish a bottle up to the high £90s. We tasted around six of the by the glass options and it’s an impressive range of trendy, challenging stuff and more traditional styles all with a sustainable bent.
My hands-down BTG favourite was the Vittorini Marche Bianco Edizione, an off-white Italian made from a blend of white pecorino grapes and the black grape Sangiovese: nutty, complex, buttery and richly textured from extended time on the lees.
What’s on the food menu at Cantaloupe?
Even with the weight of expectation (I have been excited about this one) I absolutely loved the food at Cantaloupe. The dishes have all the things I adore: loads of bitter, leafy greens, deeply savoury proteins spiked with piquant, bright flavours with seriously impressive classic French technique underpinning it all.
This place feels a bit like what Noble Rot might be if its restaurants’ aesthetics were as modern and hip as its magazine covers and it was more aimed at younger people without massive wine budgets. I adore the food (and wine, obvs) at Noble Rot and there are definite shades of it here but it feels more accessible, not least because you’d have to stay on the train for another two hours to get to your nearest NR.
But it’s very Mancunian too: small/sharing plates (though you can order in the trad way if you prefer), European influences, local produce, sustainably minded, clever, creative, cool, laid back. It sits alongside the likes of Erst and Higher Ground for me but very much has its own thing going on.
What we ate:
Cime di rapa with stracciatella, chilli and bottarga - a dream dish for me. I love cime di rapa, a bitter Italian green which is most commonly found in preserved form on pizzas over here. This was squeaky fresh and so, so delicious seasoned with umami fish flavour and just the right amount of chilli, all softened by the milky stracciatella cheese.
Mackerel, friggitelli peppers, celery and Colatura Di Alici - I remember Josh talking about playing with all kinds of alternative seasonings when I interviewed him years ago. Colatura Di Alici is a salty anchovy extract which adds even more oomph to a lovely piece of mackerel. The green peppers sit somewhere between padron pepper and jalapeno in the fruity green stakes and celery leaf adds a fragrant lift in a way I would never even thnk of doing at home.
Rabbit, lardon, prune and Vin Jaune - Vin Jaune is one of my favourite things ever and a classic French-style sauce made from the stuff had me furtively licking my plate clean. The rabbit fell off the bone and the prune brought a sticky sweetness for balance. An absolutely impeccable dish.
Lamb, almond and anchovy - We picked this because they had just sold the last pasticchio pie we had had our eye on. Oh well. The lamb was pink as Barbie’s handbag, possibly too rare for a more squeamish diner but we loved it. You could taste the provenance and it was left to shine with just a dollop of almondy relish on the side.
On the side, we had some perfectly cooked cavolo nero (another of my favourite things in the whole world to eat) and a scoop of impossibly buttery pumpkin ice cream for dessert. We were sad to have missed the exciting sounding Croatian pastry 'kremsnit’ (described as a bit like a vanilla slice) and we wished we had ordered cannellini beans or bread for a touch more carbs. But it was also really nice to have a dinner that felt indugent yet didn’t weigh us down for the walk back from the train station.
I am strongly of the belief that a lot of the most exciting culinary things happening in Greater Manchester at the moment are not in the city centre. Of course there is good stuff here but the increased cost of having a city centre business seems to have priced out most of the more diverse and exciting small indie passion projects.
This is a shame for the city but it’s really no great hardship to get around to other parts of the region to explore these types of places. As a long time city centre dweller, I find it refreshing to go out in Stockport or Levy or Prestwich or Sale for a change. It takes EIGHT MINUTES to get a train from Piccadilly to Stockport and Canteloupe is about a ten minute walk from the train station.
Wherever you live, I urge you to make the trip to this exciting new restaurant from a genuinely passionate team. If you call Stockport home right now, lucky you.
I wonder if you could do a Walking Wine Tour Stockport Special Kel? I’d be up for it!
I need to pay this place a visit. Xx