The Alchemist has been on my 'must visit' list for quite a while now so when a gal from work suggested we go, I was in! Throughout January The Alchemist had 50% off your food bill when booking a table online so we of course took advantage of that. We booked in for after work on a Tuesday which was also Payday so it was a pretty good day to go out.

Me and 4 other friends from work headed over to New York street in Manchester, we were a little early but our table was ready. The place was very photogenic with an urban theme, even the staff aprons were on theme. We were handed menus whilst we took in the venue and snapped a few pics for the gram of course. We started off with the drinks menu so we could start our Alchemist theatrical experience off with a bang. I ordered the 'Light Bulb Moment', this arrived with dry ice setting the scene; this called for lots of photos and boomerang's (check my Instagram for the video). One of my friends ordered the 'Legal One' which arrived also with dry ice as a feature but also came in a bong.

I'd already looked at the menu before arriving so had a pretty good idea of what I was going to order, I went with the Chicken in a Basket and a side of Mac & Cheese. A couple of the others, chose to order a few starters as their main and the others went with a sharer option. The food was brought to the table without a long wait and the table was filled with plates, bowls and what-not; it looked like so much food. We all got stuck in straight away and pretty much just ate everything.

My 'Chicken in a Basket' came in a chicken shaped basket with 5-6 strips of chicken, sweet potato fries (you have a choice of fries), green slaw and BBQ sauce. The mac & cheese was a decent sized portion for a side plate and was super cheesy!! The whole meal was delicious, the chicken was tender and juicy, the tangy BBQ sauce not only worked well with my meal but also my side dish, the green slaw was also a nice extra and you can't go wrong with sweet potato fries. With the 50% off the food bill, my whole meal came too £9.25; total January bargain. To be honest I'd of happily paid full price for my meal as it was spot on.

All the others enjoyed their food, the sharer came on a tiered stand which was space saving but also created a show stopper feel, there starter plates were bigger than expected and everyone was full by the end. Unfortunately they had run out of the Baked Alaska dessert that I wanted to order so I didn’t personally have afters but enjoyed the rest of my cocktail. 

Since I booked online, I got a 'Thanks for visiting us' email with a 25% off the food code for my next visit so I will most definitely be back!

Have you visited The Alchemist before? Let me know what you think in the comments or over on Instagram.