A lot of stalls inside and out. If you need something I can guarantee you would find it here!read more

A humongous indoor market that holds hundreds and hundreds of stalls selling all kinds of food and…read moremerchandise. A wide variety of items can be found, although I can't speak for the quality. The website lists the available traders along with a map. The area was bustling with people on a Friday afternoon, but not as crowded compared to some of the other markets that I have visited. We simply did a brief walkthrough that took about half-an-hour. There is a food court too for those looking for a quick bite.

Held twice a month in Manchester city centre, Real Food Market sees the North West's farmers…read moredismount their tractors to give Manchester's pasty-faced masses a taste of real nutrition as Mother Nature intended. (I've uploaded over 30 photos, so do have a look!) There are about thirty market stalls in all - hot takeway foods for you to eat on a bench in Piccadilly Gardens, plus apple tarts, fudge, cupcakes, cheeses, preserves and crafts to take home. (As a vegetarian, I didn't pay too much attention to additional non-vegetarian food, but there are stalls in this category which can boast having been featured several times on local television.) I paid £2.50 for a container of Carrot & Coriander Soup the size of a small bucket, mopped up with a Caribbean style vegetarian patty, £1.50. The soup was great, the patty OK. From the Caribbean stall I would be more likely to skip the patty next time and try the Caribbean vegetable curry on rice & beans. Or try something else from the soup stall. Plus, check out Trove Foods, which sells homemade jams and marmalades in recycled jars. http://www.trovefoods.co.uk/home I took home jars of Seville Marmalade and Carrot & Almond Jam - delicious stuff, and a lovely young couple run this business together. Here's a summary of the rest of the stalls and again, do check out my photos as that will give you a good idea: * Hot foods: fresh soups (Carrot & Coriander, Smoked Sausage & Butterbean, Roasted Red Pepper & Tomato, Leek & Potato), BBQ chicken, burgers and big piles of juicy fried onions. Caribbean patties (including vegetarian) plus curried goat, jerk chicken or vegetarian curry with rice & beans. Samosas, spicy chickpea wraps, seekh kebabs. * Sweet foods: patisserie (apple or apricot tarts), homemade sweets and fudges, home baking, cupcakes by Cupcake Palace, retro macaroons. * For your kitchen pantry: Trove Foods homemade marmalade, jams, and spicy sauces and pickles; Mrs. Kirkham's artisan cheeses. * Crafts: bags, African crafts and jewellery, enamelled tableware. I am still quite a Manchester Markets newbie, but I would say the Real Food Market is neck-and-neck with the Arndale Market Food Court and definitely worth timing a visit to town on the second or fourth weekend in the month to catch it. It's all good retro, low carbon, tasty fun - Real Food Market FTW!

I love food, and I love local produce even more, so I was really pleased to hear about this…read morebi-monthly market held in Piccadilly Gardens. People are looking more and more to their local producer, knowing they're getting eco-friendly quality straight from the source, and I'm all for it. You can pretty much get anything here, great fresh breads, conserves, meats, dairy, speciality cheeses, pies, pickles, ales, puddings. It's an epicurian's paradise and always puts a smile on my face. It runs Friday and Saturday on the 2nd and 4th weekend of the month between 10-6pm.

It's good to see that there's still room for an old-fashioned greengrocers somewhere in Leeds. Over…read morethe past few years, I've noticed them disappear in other nearby suburbs such as Cookridge and Adel, but this one on Town Street has held its ground. It offers a pretty impressive selection of fresh fruit and veg, some of which is local, and all of which is more appealing than that which is on offer just up the road in Morrisons. It will probably cost you more per item than the supermarket, but for those people who like to feel, admire and choose their own groceries, this is a small price to pay.

A bit of local flavour that's around at the moment is a lovely little set of stall that have set up…read morein Piccadilly Gardens, creating a mini little market. There are only a handful of stalls, but each is worth a visit. They include: 1. A Jamaican Food Stall selling jerk chicken and goat stew with soup for four quid! 2. A sweets stall selling amazing candy of all sorts of flavours 3. A cheese stall which smells amazing and has a great range of fresh cheeses. Some of the cheeses are worth seeing for the sheer size of them! 4. A pie stall selling large pies for £3.50 or small ones for £2. All look incredible and are in puffy pastry in pretty star shapes. 5. A fresh meat stall 6. A stall selling rubbish stuff. Check it out!

What better on a beautiful day than to wander around a Farmers Market smelling freshly cooked…read morebread, roasted hog, hot dogs, cakes, exotic African cooked meats, Chinese and Jamaican street food, curries and Paella. It's the culinary world on an al fresco plate in the heart of the city. A quick delicious imaginative fix for the urban gastronome

And there I was blissfully unaware of the chain that is R K Harris. Providing another area with a…read moremulticoloured display of plump and juicy vegetables and fruit with a slightly tired but very friendly staff member on-site to help and serve you at the till. This shop is large and literally contains everything you could need for a decent cook off, so avoid that nasty supermarket and walk that little bit extra to go to a decent fruiterers.

It was a happy day when I discovered that Crossgates too had a branch of the R K Harris & Sons…read morefruitier fame. The staff seemed as helpful as the Headingley lot, the prices were just as cheap and the stock just as wide ranging! What could be better than buying a decent bunch from the local fruit and veg shop, as opposed to the aforementioned supermarket, by Amy P? With red and green seedless grapes at 69p per lb, a sack of potatoes to feed the masses at £3.95, 8 clementines at 99p and even blooming duck eggs, for crying out loud, at 29p what could be more exciting and reasonably priced than R K Harris and the boys? I think my only option is going to be to check out if my local Headingley branch sells duck eggs, and start looking up some recipes. Yey!

Wow this was an absolute delight to go to last weekend, I can't believe I have lived in Leeds all…read morethese years and never been before. I didn't actually believe that anything substantial, let alone good, could take place in the small rose garden outside of the bar, The Arc, in Headingley. It just looked too small. But when I went last weekend it was like the space had magically morphed and increased in size! There were stalls selling organic vegetables, fruit, cheese, local wine, local meat, cakes, bread, Indian food, eggs, even a stall selling plants from a nursery in Pudsey. They had some pots of raspberry stems but I was on my bike so I couldn't get them home. Fortunately, I got their card and might pop along during the week to pick some up as they were a good price and I know they will work on the allotment as they have been grown in Leeds. Besides the market stalls there was a live band! This made it for me as usually at farmers markets you want to linger a bit but once you've made your purchases can't really find a reason to but the band was the perfect Saturday morning entertainment. If you haven't been down you better give it a go!

There's nothing quite so entertaining as watching harassed-looking people stumble out of…read moreSainsbury's with bags bulging with bread, eggs and vegetables while you hop across the road to buy the same goods at cheaper prices and a far higher quality - such is the beauty of Headingley Farmers' Market. With stalls selling tasty organic vegetables, free-range eggs the size of your palm, fresh fish and meat, artisan cheeses and a whole host of seasonal, local treats, this market, held the second Saturday of each month, turns the weekly shop into a day out in its own right. There are always plenty of free samples to taste, and with each purchase helping to support local farmers and keep your food miles low, stuffing your face has never felt so good!

Home to cheap booze, pasties, stamps, magazines, cigarettes, toiletries etc etc. Londis is one of…read morethose be it all stores whilst coming just short of a full blown supermarket, with a post office at the back its useful for those expired passports and parcels. Londis also stocks Nourishment, one of the most god forsaken beverages ever to be served in a tin. So it's a winner in my book. This shop is great for when tesco express cops out of stocking that certain something. You nip round the corner and you can usually find it here, the list for me goes on and on but includes mozzarella, a courgette, stamps and soup all of which I've managed to find when other stores have failed. A wonderful saviour.

The best thing about this newsagents is that it sells all the newspapers at student prices i.e. 20p…read moreon weekdays. You don't have to be a student or even pretend to be one to take advantage of this offer, so it's worth a trip round the corner from Tesco if you're after a copy of the Independent or Guardian. They also have pretty good offers on alcohol which are displayed on fluorescent paper in the windows, no doubt with the intention of attracting students from Wilmslow Park, which is located up above. But come on WP students, don't be lazy. Pop round the corner to Tesco or Lidl where you can pick up your tins of beans and ready meals for cheaper than Londis.

I'm not a fan of ASDA Hulme…read more.. It's great in that it's huge, even had clothes and technology stuff upstairs... The downsides far outweigh the good! The veg section smells like sick... in the last two weeks I've been 3-4 times and each time the fresh produce section stinks... it's really off-putting and means I don't end up buying anything fresh. There's also a larger than normal amount of rude people shopping there. Pushing past you, generally irate customers... on top of this we always seem to get a member of staff on the checkouts that is stuck on slow... All in all I like having a good meander around to see what the retail giants have on offer but I find when I visit ASDA Hulme I just want to get out of there ASAP. Sorry ASDA Hulme you just don't cut mustard... and you stink...

Back in Liverpool myself and my better half would become truely excited at the prospect of visiting…read morethe local Asda. Why I hear you cry? Because as students in a time where most clubs/pubs did not have a 24hr license and shut at 1am/2am there was nothing more fum that a drunken wander around asda to see what rubbish we could buy. When we arrived in Manchester we had no idea that round the corner to our delight there was....a 24hr Asda. However gone are the days that we cannot stay in the clubs/pubs til 4am and now Asda has become to us what it is to every other grown up individual....a hassle on a Sunday, an obstacle course through crying children and down and outs. I am only consoled by the fact we do stay in the clubs/pubs till 4am and that our drunken trips to ASDA have not ceased to continue because we are getting old and boring. Asda we still love you, we love you for making us feel at home wherever we go.