Manchester Arndale Food Hall: Southern Eleven

Last week Manchester Confidential received a delivery: a gang of new office desks.

Unfortunately these brand spanking new desks were not correctly assembled. This meant that after persistent badgering from office manager Kaiser-Fuhrer Kelly Ormesher, a selection of office lackeys were forced to put their DIY hats on to help rebuild and re-arrange the office.

A couple of hours later and with the all the drilling, lifting and re-arranging done it was time to treat ourselves to some calories, so in the search of some dirty fast-food we headed to the home of the dirtiest quick-fix in town: the Arndale Food Court.

For those of you that have never been, the Food Court is essentially the Mecca of fast food – in the same way Mecca Bingo is the mecca of bingo. Representing the big guns of the guilty pleasure world there are McDonalds, KFC, Subway, Greggs and Pizza Hut, and for the really health conscious, there’s Spud-U-Like.

On the escalator the debate over whether a KFC or a McDonalds was more appropriate was already raging. But, as we reached the top, a spanner was thrown into the works. We were greeted by the most enthusiastic salesman in the history of salesmen.

“Excuse me, would you like to try a free sample”

Not ones to turn down free food we all duly obliged.

“That is the pork sandwich from Southern Eleven. We cook all our meats on site before marinating them in sauce for a day, then when you order you pick a different sauce as well. Do you want to try the beef sandwich?”

Again we all tucked into the free sample before being offered to try both the pork and beef again. Southern Eleven were so keen to have us try their food that we could have quite happily dined out on all the free samples they wanted to deal us.

However, it turned out this was all a clever ploy. As we all had been listening intently to the overly enthusiastic samples man, he had begun to walk towards the secluded corner in which Southern Eleven lies and now we were stood there as well, at the counter, with two men waiting to take our order.

This created an interesting moral dilemma. We were not only the only people in the queue but we were the only people on the side of the food court where Southern Eleven resides. The most enthusiastic man ever had swept us up into his sales pitch and delivered us to the counter where two of his colleagues were now staring at us, waiting for our order.

To turn around and walk over to one of the fast food behemoths like KFC or McDonalds would break hearts and cause potentially irreversible emotional damage to Mr Enthusiasm. The problem was, I hadn’t come to the food court for well cooked marinated meats, I had come to the food court for filth. I wanted a meal that would take minutes off my life.

Whilst I pondered on what to do, I missed my escape. Alex had declared that he didn’t like the idea of meat being marinated for a day and was now half way across the food court to KFC.

Mark however had decided to give Southern Eleven a bash and now being too confused to make a decision for myself, I decided to do so as well.

Southern Eleven’s selling point is that it deals in American style BBQ meats. You pick your meal from arrange of options such as the pork sandwich, beef sandwich and BBQ ribs and then similar to Nando’s, you choose how you want your sandwich to be marinated. You are then given a choice of sides and offered an array of add-ons.

By this point, through all the previous over-thinking, I had turned into a zombie and was agreeing to everything.

“Would you like a chicken sandwich as well?”

“Yes.”

“Would you like a savoury muffin for an extra 50p?”

“Yes.”

“Would you like any sauces for an extra 20p?”

“Yes.”

“Which ones?”

“Yes.”

When this kerfuffle was over, Alex re-joined us from KFC and we found somewhere to eat.

The food is essentially the middle ground between KFC and Nando’s or at least the chicken sandwich offering was. Whilst not being a tasty fat filled guilty pleasure like KFC, it was well on the way to Nando’s quality.

Southern Eleven is definitely worth a go. Despite only trying the samples, the pork and beef sandwiches did taste good and the chicken sandwich was a respectable quick fix, which did not lead to the unavoidable food coma that most other fast food outlets put you in after eating.

If you're a fan of BBQ meats or simply fancy a change Southern Eleven is worth a visit and if you do go it’s highly likely that you will be welcomed by some of the most enthusiastic staff you have ever met. We were surprised we didn’t come away with a bogus alarm system or new life insurance.

There’s only room to say one last thing.

“Yes.”

Rating:	13/20
Breakdown:	Breakdown not applicable really as...well...it’s just the Arndale Food Hall
Address:	Manchester Arndale Food Hall That big building With all the shops You know the one