Food & Drink
The UK’s biggest Italian food festival is coming back to Manchester this summer
Festa Italiana will boast the very best cuisine and culture Italy has to offer
Manchester is in for a treat this summer with the return of the UK’s biggest Italian food festival.
Described as ‘the country’s most exciting and vibrant festival of Italian food, drink and culture’, Festa Italiana is a unique celebration of all things Italy, and will once again be gracing Manchester’s Cathedral Gardens for the August bank holiday weekend.
The festival found life five years ago by the family-run Italian restaurant group Salvi’s, and was quick to grow in popularity, with over 38,000 people visiting during last year’s event alone.
And this year, a number of the festival’s most popular faces will be returning alongside some exciting new additions.
The festival’s famed workshops and demonstrations will take place once again, alongside some of Italy’s finest cuisine courtesy of celebrated Italian chefs Giancarlo Caldesi (Return to Tuscany, Saturday Kitchen, Sunday Brunch), celebrity chef and award-winning restaurateur Aldo Zilli (The One Show, This Morning, Celebrity Masterchef), Great British Bake Off 2021 winner Giuseppe Dell’Anno, and, of course, Festa founder Maurizio Cecco.
Specialist pastaia Carmela Sereno Hayes will also join the line up, where she will host her acclaimed pasta-making workshops across the weekend.
And like previous years, some of Manchester’s most celebrated Italian food and drink traders will be dishing up their own takes of Italian cuisine,
On the drinks front, some of Italy’s most popular drinks brands will be on hand to help guests wash down their pizza and pasta, including Gin Mare, Luxardo and Poretti.
And brand new to Festa this year will be an Italian art exhibition, details of which will be announced in the coming weeks.
Alongside a line up of live musicians and entertainment across the weekend, there will also be activities to keep children entertained while their parents feast upon pasta, pizza and Aperol… so families need not worry.
Festa Italiana will take place at Manchester’s Cathedral Gardens across the late bank holiday weekend from August 26th-28th, and will be completely free to enter.
More details will be announced in the coming weeks – visit the Festa Italiana website to stay posted with news and updates.