“A certain old-school formality”: Maya, Chorlton Street, reviewed

Now I know what a mole feels like when I train my phone’s flashlight on the paper that makes up the Maya menu. Typical darkness prevails around our corner table under the belching speaker. A marble-topped bar with a golden portal dominates this main dining room. I’m not sure we signed up for this mood. We’ve innocently come looking for the promised “ingredient-led, hyper-seasonal and regularly changing menu” from Gabe Lea, a Manc chef with an impressive CV (Le Manoir, French fries and more).

That’s why we opted for this downstairs experience over the bright ground floor, which promises a “modern menu of European brasserie classics.” However, I’m not sure if the all-day format will work properly. The website is a bit vague on details, offering only a sample of the à la carte menu, which is not dissimilar to the one we’re looking at now – minus its inviting snacks of tomato en croûte and Lindisfarne oysters/spiced consommé. it was good to be.

Also strangely missing is the fine dining de rigueur bread with great butter to nibble on while mulling over the wine list. We must have asked for it because we were first presented with a spirits booklet that hinted at certain priorities.

This was polite food, complemented by a certain old-school formality in the service, with one waiter bringing each pairing of courses from the kitchen on a tray. Then a separate colleague picked them up and brought them to the table.

We are still not neglected. There are plenty of staff. And yet… it feels nervous. Maya has been “anticipated” for so long, and that brings its own pressures. Chef Gabe joined the ambitious project in August 2022 and expected it to open early the following year, but it ended up taking a total of 20 months. My inner Attenborough likens that period to the pregnancy of an African elephant. I don’t know the whole delayed gratification story. The big elephant in the room? Or rather, three rooms on three floors, plus a few very Instagrammable loos. There seem to have been structural problems in the conversion of this former textile warehouse – the actual Mash & Air that pioneered a century ago.

Constant attention to detail seems to be locked into the Mayan way of thinking. After our dinner visit, a “give us your feedback” email quickly arrived. Allow six minutes to tick all 34 boxes. Phew. The three-course meal itself took just over an hour and cost the two of us £230 (including a 13.5% service charge). Did it live up to expectations?

The menu read well – a manageable selection of five starters, five mains and five puddings – and it was good to see so many fish options where we went. That’s why our wine selection is Tambora Albarino, a rewardingly rich and peachy white in our parade of scallops, monkfish, wild sea bass and turbot. It cost £65 for an unusually small wine list by the bottle, which soon went over the £100 mark. A number of wine racks loom in the penumbral depths of the dining room. Maybe the basement aspect is still in progress?

Let’s start with the culmination of the dishes we tried, because one dessert is the best I’ve had all year. The Pear Tatin (£12) requires a 15 minute wait to be baked and is well worth it. Rising from a pool of Calvados-tinged caramel is an obelisk of a whole pear encased in a delicate batter that might almost be bricks. There is an abundance of cinnamon quill and vanilla embedded in the fruit. Lose, don’t chew. Stupid vanilla ice cream has also definitely been introduced as a pod. Delicious, though not quite as spectacular, is a bijou serving of triple Brillat Savarin cheesecake with berry sorbet and crumble (£12).

Classic skills also play a role in fish dishes, but with more varied results. The hand-dived scallop was diced to create an almost translucent tartare (£22). It is difficult to tell if the advertised white grape is produced in the same way. The bergamot citrus is subtle, but the listed truffle is AWOL. Verdict: underpowered.

The starter on the other side of the table suffered from its introduction. A batch of roasted monkfish (£18), with some cling film and Granny Smith gel cubes, seemed to drift from a pool of crackling green oil emulsion with shelled clams and poached fennel. The saffron had felt like too much of an addition, but it was also surprisingly unnoticeable.

Fortunately, the main dishes weren’t quite as busy on the plate, but they suffered from a sauce that was too intense and too salty for my taste. Something of a slight decline, as both the turbot and sea bass fillets were wonderful, satisfied individuals. The sauce for the former was the classic Bonne femme, for the latter a brown butter sabayon, luxurious treatments £40 and £35 a pop. Both have mushrooms, turbot girolles, white asparagus and bare mussels.

This was polite food, complemented by a certain old-school formality in the service, with one waiter bringing each pairing of courses from the kitchen on a tray. Then a separate colleague picked them up and brought them to the table. Maybe it’s the way they do things Mayfair glam haunts Isabel, a previous success story Maya creator, Scottie Bhattari, whose stellar hospitality record also includes Soho House and Petersham Nurseries.

As he applies A-lister Art Deco pastiche to our trademark industrial fabric at Maya, he’s installed a third space even deeper, an exclusive late-night den that he insists won’t be a private members’ club. It has never worked in Manchester.

As is clear, much of this is not my bag, but I wish it well. Will it replicate the celebrity honeypot that was once Mash & Air? There is a lot of competition with competing London imports. I just hope it holds its nerve with a good food offering, albeit more relaxed. Time is finally on Maya’s side.

Maya40 Chorlton Street, M3 3BG