Open Kitchen cafe to open in Manchester’s People’s History Museum

Open Kitchen at People’s History Museum with work alongside a range of food businesses to source food that would otherwise have gone to waste as well as buy ingredients from a sustainable food chain, supporting other ethical businesses and social enterprises, in what is claimed as the first of its kind in the UK to take this combined approach.

The cafe will launch on 19 April with an all-day menu a self-serve operation with the venue switching to offer table service drinks and small plates in the evening.

The menu will be predominantly vegetarian and vegan with a small selection of meat dishes using Pasture for Life locally sourced meat and will change seasonally. Upcycled, recycled and reclaimed materials will be used where possible with all of the café’s takeaway packaging 100% compostable.

“We share Open Kitchen’s passion, belief and dedication for access to good food for all and look forward to their brilliant food and drink offer being part of PHM,” says PHM director Katy Ashton.

“Through this innovative partnership we will continue to place communities at the heart of everything we do, advocating environmental responsibility, inclusion and access, and committing to fair pay as Real Living Wage Employers.”

Open Kitchen began life as a pop-up project and has operated a ‘pay-as-you-feel’ waste food restaurant on Manchester’s Oxford Street.  All profits subsidise its work, with Open Kitchen supporting independent food banks and homelessness support charities with meals, food and supplies.

“When you work in a huge environmental problem like food waste, you’re always sort of trying to put yourself out of a job by pushing to fix the broken system, hopefully to the point where food waste stops happening in the first place,” says Corin Bell, founder and director at Open Kitchen.

“It felt important for us to start to demonstrate how we can change our food system to design out food waste.  We hope that by demonstrating how short supply chains, working directly with producers, buying local and seasonal, etc can reduce food waste, we can inspire people to change their habits around food.”