The Thomas Street institution was reinvented as a pub and dining room earlier this year...
The Trof has been added to the Michelin Guide, just a few months after the long-standing Northern Quarter venue was given a major overhaul.
The Thomas Street pub, formerly known simply as Trof, and which reopened in its current form in May, is now listed by Michelin among its picks for Manchester.
The addition marks a quick turnaround for owners Jamie Pickles and Matt Nellany, who made the decision earlier this year to transform Trof after more than two decades as one of the Northern Quarter’s best-known bars.
“When we made the decision to turn an absolute institution into a whole new thing, we really did sit and think long and hard about how our guests would see it,” said co-owner Jamie Pickles.
“Trof was still busy, still thriving and successful but we just had this itch that had to be scratched and it seems like our risk paid off. We’re so grateful to everyone who’s been in for a pint and a scotch egg, dinner in the dining room or a roast – it’s meant the world.”
Trof originally opened in 2003, occupying a red-brick building on the corner of Thomas Street and Soap Street which dates back to 1881. Over the following two decades, it became closely associated with the development of the Northern Quarter as one of Manchester’s main food, drink and nightlife districts.
Its latest incarnation saw the venue renamed The Trof and reworked across its three floors. The ground floor now operates primarily as a pub, while the first floor has become a dedicated dining room and the top floor is used for private events.
The food takes its cues from classic British pub cooking, with dishes including hogget mince on dripping toast, dressed crab, chicken schnitzel and ox cheek pie and mash. Downstairs, drinkers can order bar snacks including crab on toast, crispy potatoes and scotch eggs alongside cask and keg beers.
Sundays, meanwhile, are centred around traditional roasts, another part of the pub-focused direction Pickles and Nellany introduced with the relaunch.
The Trof follows a run of recent Manchester and Greater Manchester additions to the Michelin Guide. Last autumn, Winsome, Climat, Bangkok Diners Club at the Edinburgh Castle, Pip at Treehouse Hotel were all added, alongside Cantaloupe in Stockport and Stow, Pickles and Nellany’s other restaurant on Bridge Street, specialising in open-fire cooking.
Further recognition came earlier this year when Erst in Ancoats and Cantaloupe were awarded Bib Gourmands for 2026, with Almanac in nearby Glossop also receiving the distinction. Cantaloupe has now changed its offering, however, recently flipping itself into a bar.
Here’s all the Manchester restaurants currently listed in the Michelin Guide:
mana
Skof
Adam Reid at The French
Higher Ground (Bib Gourmand)
Erst
El Gato Negro
Another Hand
The Spärrows
Winsome
Pip
Climat
Stow
Sampa
10 Tib Lane
Bar Posie
The Trof
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