Pizza Pilgrims

Italian

Unit SU48, Bermondsey Street, SE1 9SP

£

Pizza Pilgrims, is the brainchild of brothers Thom and James Elliot which serves slow proved Neapolitan Pizza. The idea started with a humble Pizza van and has now graduated to six locations across London, as well as being named one of the must-eat places to eat pizza around the world. Whilst the two chaps are UK born and bred, they have done extensive research across Italy as to what makes the most ‘perfect’ pizza. This was almost an accident, once they realised the expense of importing a van from Italy was well over £1,500, they decided to go out and get it themselves, and drive it back to the UK with 5 or 6 stops along the way. Well, 5 or 6 soon became 30 and was documented by a small production company that turned it into a series. Thom returned to London and opened a stall on Berwick Street and hosted food bloggers in pubs to help them taste test, whilst James went back to Naples to work in a pizzeria. They admitted they didn’t know it all – they were learning.

My first experience with Pizza Pilgrims was in a Swingers Crazy Golf venue, back at a 2017 office summer shindig. I remember it being really, really good. Much better than I expected for a crazy golf venue. In 2018 I did a very short stint in digital marketing where the company I worked for created their website. My ‘welcome lunch’ was at Pizza Pilgrims Covent Garden, and we went to the launch party of their restaurant in Bank. A terrible time, coupled with fantastic pizza: it may be the only fond memory of those treacherous two months. Over lockdown I had a couple of the Pizza Pilgrims ‘cook at home’ kits – genuinely the best DIY restaurant kit I’ve tried. I was sceptical with the absence of a pizza oven, but the dough is so delicious that the frying pan and grill combo somehow make it work.

I recently went back to a physical joint in London Bridge, to meet up with a friend from Uni who I hadn’t seen in 5 years. You can’t book for groups smaller than 6, so we tried our chances at 7:30 on a Tuesday evening and managed to nab a table upstairs. It was busy, but by no means should have been unmanageable. It took 20 minutes for us to order drinks, and another 20 for them to arrive. We asked for some water 4 times before giving up and going to collect glasses and some (hopefully) untouched tap water ourselves from the shelves near the door. After trying both the Pilgrims Red (£15.25 for 500ml) and the Njiro, Nero D’Avola Tola Red (£24 for a bottle), I would definitely say to get the latter as the Pilgrims red was medicinal, sour and pretty disgusting. For food, we ordered the Double Pepperoni & Spicy Honey (£11.95) and the Mushroom & Truffle (£11.5) as well as all three dips Pesto Aioli, Nduja and White Truffle (£4 for all 3).

Once again, the service sucked. Our Pizza’s were delivered to the wrong table, like actually put down in front of people before they realised and then they were removed (not very covid friendly if you ask me). The Pizza itself was bigger than the plate which is always a good sign, but was slightly on the cold side which suggested it may have been sitting downstairs for a while, or maybe lost some heat during the to-me-to-you trip around the tables it did before reaching us. Whilst the dough remains as tasty as I remember, the structure was pretty limp and the crusts much more hollow than ones I have had before. The pepperoni and honey was a dreamy collaboration, however the mushroom pizza wasn’t heavy enough on the truffle and the ricotta base made everything a little too creamy and sickly. I only had one slice of this one, but it was enough to remind me why I stick to tomato bases. The dips were all great, and it was nice to have a mix of them, but would have liked a bit more substance to the crust to enliven the dipping.

We didn’t get any desert (although I would recommend the Nutella pizza from previous dining experiences) as we were stuffed, and by the time our plates had been taken away we were well and truly digested and over it - leave it too long and you’ll miss it! Whilst the pizzas and dips still tasted good, the service was truly appalling. If it’s truly this difficult on a Tuesday night, I dread to think how ignored you get on the weekend. Stick to the cook at home packs for this one.

OVERALL RATING: ***

https://www.pizzapilgrims.co.uk/