Gaucho Grill, Manchester

Pleasant live music, adult dining room atmosphere, and delicious rotisserie meats make this restaurant a great destination for those who want something different from the chain restaurants.

On business in Manchester on my own from Mallorca, Spain, fancied a steak and was told that this was the best place to go. Got there at 8.30 on a Saturday night was told that they do not have tables for 1 person are you joking I asked, NO was the answer, so I send that I would order 2 of everything. After walking away to talk to someone she agreed that I could have a table. So a meal for 1 with a bottle of wine cost me 80 pounds, yes they made me order 2 starters 2 main meals 2 sweets and the biggest joke of the night, 2 coffees how mad is that!

The best steaks in Manchester cooked to perfection!

The Gaucho Grill has a reputation of being the best steakhouse in Manchester. Having never come across another steakhouse in Manchester I can see why it gets its reputation. Certainly it is difficult to find a steak in the UK that remotely compares to the quality of the steak you'd get in a cheap steakhouse in the U.S. so the Gaucho Grill at least achieved this.

The restaurant is meant to be an Argentinian steakhouse and is modelled after the restaurants found in that country, at least according to my dining companion who had recently returned from Argentina. We were seated promptly in a quiet, modern restaurant complete with nice mood lighting and brought the drinks menu. Shockingly, we could not find a bottle of wine below £19.50, which seems odd considering they had only Argentinian wine and those don't tend to be too expensive. We settled on a bottle of red and it was distinctly average. Then we were brought bread while we perused the menu. To my shock, starters, which sounded nice, began at around £7. There were a variety of salads, some Argentinian pastries (kind of like a samosa) which we ordered to share (you choose 2 from a variety of different ones such as spicy chicken, spinach and cheese, etc.) They are each priced around £3.75, but you have to order at least 2.

The menu begins with the non-steak dishes. You can get a variety of chicken, fish or vegetarian dishes for between £10-£20, but nobody's there for these. There's also a couple of types of burgers. These dishes, however, come unaccompanied and you have to add sides from the side dish menu - all costing extra.

Then we come to the steak menu. They have a variety of cuts from rump, to sirloin to fillet to a very odd spiral dish in a marinade. You choose your cut (they have a meat board to show you what the cut looks like) and the weight and each steak is priced accordingly, with the 225g being the smallest, up to a 750g (yikes!). The prices for a steak range from £10.50-£30. We ordered 225g fillet steaks at £14.50 apiece. These come with a choice of sauce, if you order from the 4 cheapest (Bearnaise, peppercorn, etc.) but the more interesting sauces are extra - £4.00 or so extra. I tried a leek and white crab sauce which was, admittedly, delicious, and my friend ordered a truffle and porcini mushroom sauce. You can also get chips or a baked potato with your dish, however vegetables cost extra so we had to pay for our broccoli and cabbage side.

When they brought the meal out they asked who had the medium rare steak - my friend - and gave us our food. They got the steaks mixed up, which we didn't realise until 10 minutes in. They offered to bring new ones but we figured it was fine as it was - I didn't mind so much but I think my companion found her steak not all that she'd expected owing to it being less pink than she wanted. In their favour, they were mortified at the mistake and offered us free coffee and dessert - a welcome gesture. The coffee was OK and the chocolate truffle cake we ordered for dessert was lovely.

Overall, I was impressed with the level of service, but the food itself, for the quality of what we got, should have been cheaper. The starters were nearly as expensive as I'd have expected the mains to be and while £14.50 is not bad for a fillet steak, it wasn't the best fillet steak I've ever eaten, and once you factor in the cost of side dishes and sauce it becomes very expensive for the quality of the steak.

I guess my point is, I'd be raving about this restaurant if the wines started at £12 a bottle and you could eat for £25 a head. But at £35 a head (and that's with dessert and coffee free), it was a bit overpriced. However, it is still the nicest steak I've had in the UK. But only because any other steak I've been served here has been simply poor.