Review: The Beautiful Pizza Boy – Peckham’s Got ★★★★★ PIZZA!
The Beautiful Pizza Boy
182 Bellenden Road, SE15 4BW
Tue-Fri: 17:00 – 22:30, Sat: 12:00 – 22:30, Sun: 12:00 – 21:00
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The team behind Pedler have expanded their Peckham-based empire with The Beautiful Pizza Boy – a sure-fire smash hit of a restaurant that brings a different kind of YUMMY to Bellenden Road!
A short walk from the sensory overload that is Peckham Rye, The Beautiful Pizza Boy brings the tastes of Naples to (the admittedly posh end of) SE15.
Combining ace cocktails with distinctive wood fired pizzas, this warm and cozy neighbourhood pizzeria from Team Pedler is an oasis of authentic yet imaginative Italian flavours: super-tasty pizzas from the imposing wood fired oven, delectable cured meats and a cocktail list featuring Little Bird Gin and other small batch spirits.
Burratella Pizza – The Beautiful Pizza Boy, Peckham
As with Pedler, effort has been made to make the space feel warm and inviting – a place to while away the evenings with great food and good conversation.
Our waitress for our visit, Berenika, was an absolute star – not only did she suggest dishes and remain good-natured despite our initial misunderstanding of her name (NOT VERONICA!), she also gave us some good travel tips! It’s details like this that so many restaurants fall down on – warm and friendly staff who don’t give the impression that you’re just customer number 46 of the evening, or an obstacle to an early finish.
The food, of course, is the star – but you’d be well advised to sample an aperitif or three before tucking into the grub. The Negroni Sbagliato was spot on, tantalizingly dry – and the Biciletta (Campari, Cinzano Bianco and white wine) seemed to go down so well that only one of us got to try it…
The two-person plate of cured meat, pickles, artichokes, ciabatta and breadsticks is HUGE – more than enough for two, although that didn’t stop us also disappearing a plate of arancini which, if being very, very picky, could just have done with a little more seasoning.
And then, THE PIZZAS! A perfect balance of crispiness and chewiness is a difficult pizza base to achieve, but The Beautiful Pizza Boy boasts just such a thing – and the toppings don’t disappoint. The Diavola (nduja, tomato, spicy salami and mozzarella) truly lived up to its name: hot and spicy just as the devil himself would enjoy! The special of the day, a Burratella, was a twist on a fairly basic ham-topped pizza, but with a zingy pesto base beneath the cheese topping, and a delightful Burrata ball perched in the centre. The latter – essentially a soft mozzarella – can be pulled apart and spread out across the pizza as you wish. Combined with a healthy drizzle of chilli oil, the Burratella was a real rib-sticking feast.
Piggies that we are, we couldn’t resist a couple of side dishes: perfectly crunchy polenta chips that make you wonder why anyone bothers with potatoes, and a pretty salad of chicory dressed with crumbled gorgonzola and chestnuts – a perfect combination of crunchy, bitter leaves with a soft, tangy blue cheese. We’ve never been so full leaving a pizza restaurant! We pretty much had to roll back to To Do List HQ, having even been defeated by the final piece of pizza which was kindly boxed up for us to polish off at our leisure. Suffice to say, that take-home slice did not last long!
I am Joint Editor at To Do List. I like: nice pubs, film marathons, not doing real marathons, bad comedy, plays/musicals with shorter second halves, and the Oxford comma.
mmm looks wonderful, an Italian restaurant that is actually ran by italians….
It’s fit!¬