“From a trailer in their Eccles backyard to their own restaurant in Chorlton” was how Manchester’s Finest began sharing news that self-starters Mamadou and Gaby had secured a permanent location for their operation Lucky Mama’s. A real story of business success emerging from the nightmare of a global pandemic, back when we were yo-yoing in and out of lockdown the pair began serving excellent street food to neighbours and nearby residents. Word spread throughout the city and region about a concept as unique as the owners, who are Senegalese-Spanish-Chilean, and also now very much North West England.
Adding more complexity, Mamadou spent years living in Italy as a child, and the Old Country very much informs what’s happening here — pizza and pasta, although that’s a little too reductive. Every dish is exceptional and many so authentic you’ll struggle to track them down elsewhere in town. Others are truly inimitable and would not exist without this place. Old school ragu bigoli, a longer and thicker spaghetti style dish, and rasta pasta malfadine are just two examples. As for the dough, freshly baked foccacia should be the first port of call before looking deeper. Go far enough, and you’ll reach a pasta-on-pizza revolution, which uses the pizza as a bowl in which pleasingly good things await.
Those after something a little more traditional, meanwhile, can find an excellent range of Roman and Veneto-style squared pizzas with classic toppings like simple margarita, alongside more elaborate combinations such as Mama’s Favourite — with tuna, prawns and garlic. Meanwhile, Lucky Mama’s also does a mean line in sandwiches, using the aforementioned focaccia and wonderfully fresh ingredients, and you can get very good coffee here to take away or as an indulgent adffogato dessert – another real highlight (the sweets as a whole are very good). Run by a pair of truly welcoming an entrepreneurs whose personality shines throughout the operation, when next in Chorlton just look for the pastel-coloured (predominantly pink) interior.
