Cinepanettone & Cocktails

Think Christmas movies, think It’s a Wonderful Life, Scrooged, Nightmare Before Christmas, the Snowman and countless other festive feelgood classics. On the other hand, think Italian Christmas movies, and imagine Carry on Camping with a festive bent.

Cine-panettone are Italian comedy movies released over the Christmas period often based in, or featuring characters from the salubrious city of Milan. They also happen to feature quite a lot of nudity and some exceptionally bad acting.

Despite poor artistic merit, garbled plot-lines, gratuitous nudity and lowest-common-denominator, fore-head walloping humour, the cine-panettone offerings continue to drive festive film lovers to the big-screen in their droves.

While seasonal blockbusters Hugo, Arthur Christmas and Puss in Boots dominate the box office in the UK and America, Vacanze di Natale a Cortina is set to take the Italian box office by storm following the official theatre release today. You can check out the clip below, but it probably won’t make too much sense unless you speak Italian.



Now, Italian festive cinema aside, the team at Pesto Deansgate have a Christmas cocktail treat in store for all the party-lovers out there! This week we’ve been filming the making of some of the brand new cocktails as concocted by our very own Bartenders Extraordinaire Marcus and Christian! The guys talked us through how to make a couple of their own creations as well as their twists on cocktail classics. We’ll be sharing our secrets on YouTube in the coming days, so watch this space!

What are you up to over the festive season? Have you got a cocktail recipe you’d like to suggest? Let us know on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/pestorestaurants) or Tweet us @pestorestaurant

Interview: Victoria Jones

This week we’re catching up with Pesto’s Vicky Jones, who along with a passion for cocktails (a common theme among the Pesto team…) enjoys a bit of Ryan Giggs, Keith Lemon and, er the Royal Family!

How long have you been part of the Pesto team?

Altogether – nearly three years. I was based at Pesto Trafford Centre for two years and I’ve been at Pesto Deansgate for almost a year now.

What is the best thing about working for Pesto?

The team! I have so much fun at work every day because of the people I work with. Everybody knows each other by name and face; instead of being just an employee you’re a person.

What is your favourite Pesto dish and drink?

My favourite Pesto dish changes depending on my cravings! I’m pregnant so it really affects what I eat. When I recommend a dish I always suggest the king prawns in white wine. Its great! My drink choice would have to be a Cosmopolitan, though I must confess all the cocktails here at Deansgate are to die for!

What’s the funniest thing to have happened to you in the restaurant?

I didn’t find it very amusing but the rest of the staff did; I was walking up to a table to take an order, but tripped up on my way. I tried to pretend nothing had happened and the customers were lovely and didn’t say anything but I turned around and the staff were in hysterics. Later the customers were talking to one of the team and it turned out they found it funny too. Rather embarrassing!

Which three celebrities (dead and alive) would you invite to dinner at Pesto?


The Queen – I love the Royal Family and I hear she’s quite funny! Ryan Giggs, just because I love him and finally Keith Lemon (Leigh Francis) from Celebrity Juice as he is hilarious.

What inspired you to become a manager?

I kind of fell into it really. After moving back from Australia I started working in a pub and I continued to move up from there. It’s the perfect job for me as its very flexible and I get to talk a lot – one of my favourite past-times.

After a meal at Pesto, what’s the best thing to do in Manchester?

I would suggest the theatre as there are always great shows on, then a couple of cocktails at Pesto!

What was the last show you went to and how was it?

I saw Sister Act at the theatre recently; the show itself was great, really funny, but it was nothing like the film, which was a little unexpected.

What does the next year at Pesto hold for you?

Hopefully a really busy year; I want to learn all aspects of the business, that’s my aim!

Lattè Art at Pesto

Our restaurant managers have been busy this week with the lovely folks from Limini Coffee, who popped down to Pesto Italian Restaurants Trafford Centre to share their coffee art skills with the team.

Limini lattè artist Youri taught assistant manager Lito and the Trafford bar team how to create flowers, love hearts and teddy bears, though they might be a few more sessions away from perfecting the teddy bear!

Our coffee and machines are all provided by Limini, who we reckon provide the tastiest coffees and hot chocolates out there! So the next time you pop in on a cold winter day, treat yourself or someone else to a delicious hot drink, topped off with an adorable love heart, flower or teddy bear!

And while we're on the subject of treats, Christmas is less than seven weeks away, why not treat the office, family or someone special to a festive meal at Pesto? Check out our Christmas menu here or arrange a table here.

http://www.liminicoffee.co.uk/

http://www.pestorestaurants.co.uk/location/trafford-centre/

Pesto Italian Restaurants Manchester Harry Potter event goes down a treat!

The Pesto Italian Restaurants Manchester Harry Potter event went down a treat this weekend, as kids from across the North West lined up to have their faces painted and sample our Butterbeer!

We've added a selection of photographs from the event on this blog, but many more photographs can be found at http://pestorestaurants.co.uk/gallery or on our Facebook page at http://facebook.com/pestorestaurants

Harry Potter: The End of and Era

Following a decade of Pigwidgeon, Quidditch and general wizardry, the Harry Potter film series is coming to an end.

Thousands of Harry Potter enthusiasts from across the globe braved the typically wet British weather and camped out in Trafalgar Square for several days in anticipation of Thursday's world premier of the final instalment in the franchise. 

Rupert Grint, who plays Ron Weasley in the multi-billion pound series arrived first on the red carpet, and described the experience as “emotional” and as his favourite moment from his time in the films.

The final film, 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part Two' makes its UK cinema debut on July 15th, and at Pesto you can turn your cinema trip into an entire day of spells and sorcery with Butterbeer and face-painting!

To mark the occasion we've created our very own Butterbeer drink consisting of butterscotch syrup, cream soda and hair of Hippogriff* topped with cream and for our adult diners we have a special alcoholic version with butterscotch Schnapps, Havana rum and essence of Boggart** for just £5.

We'll also be offering free Harry Potter themed face-painting for kids and adults with every Butterbeer purchase - and one free kids Butterbeer when you show us your Harry Potter cinema stub!

Times and locations of the events are underneath the official (and stunning!) Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows trailer vid from Warner. 

Photographs and video footage of the event will be posted to Facebook so you don't even have to worry about packing your camera! If you're not already a Pesto fan, click here to like or if you're more partial to the odd tweet, click here to follow us on Twitter.

So gather up muggles and squibs, grab some galleon from the gringotts and treat the whole family to a magic day out!

 Friday 15th July 

Pesto Deansgate

Face-painting from 3pm - 5pm

Butterbeer served all week!

Saturday 16th July

Pesto Trafford Centre

Face-painting from 3pm - 5pm

Butterbeer served all week!

* we made this up
** and this

Giggling with Glee!

The Pesto Deansgate team were treated to an unexpected celebrity visit this week when Heather Morris of Glee fame stopped by for dinner and drinks with fellow cast and crew team from Glee live! 

The Glee stars enjoyed our light and refreshing Peroni by the pint and a selection of cocktails, including Cosmopolitans and Frangelics and our brand new Bloody Mary's. Our gorgeous barmen Marcus and and Stuart were also very popular!

Pesto manager Anthony and assistant Vicky were lucky enough to have themselves papped with our celeb diners and after a few hours at the restaurant the Glee team lured Anthony away to act as a tour guide for the remainder of the evening. We shan't be posting those pictures!

The two night run of Glee live at the MEN ends this evening and Pesto is only a short walk away from the venue; pop in later and you lovely Gleeks might be fortunate enough to spot a celeb at Pesto!

For full menu information, directions, contact info and much, much more please visit www.pestorestaurants.co.uk