What Is ‘London-Style’ Pizza?
Words by Christina Dean
We ask some of the city’s pizza chefs whether the capital really does have its own style
Opened in 1803 just off Leicester Square, the Italian Eating House was the first Italian restaurant to open in London. It’s unclear whether they served pizza, so Olivelli in Bloomsbury, which was founded over a century later in 1934, is widely regarded to be the first place pizza was sold in the capital. Though the number of Italian restaurants and cafes were increasing as Italian migration to the UK grew, it wasn’t until 1965 that London got its first pizzeria – a little place by the name of Pizza Express on Wardour Street in Soho. Then the US chains started moving in, with Pizza Hut opening in Islington in 1973, and Domino’s setting up in Luton in 1985.
Though you could get pizza in local Italian restaurants as well as from the big high street chains, that was kind of it when it came to any sort of regional variety. Then Franco Manca opened in Brixton in 2008 and Londoners quickly got a taste for Neapolitan-style pizzas, characterised by the soft dough, light and puffy crusts, and simple toppings, cooked super fast at a high heat. After touring Italy in a Piaggo Ape van, Thom and James Elliot set up a stall at Berwick Street Market in 2012 and Pizza Pilgrims was born. Neapolitan pizza would come to be the dominant style of pizza in London, and nationwide. There are now around 70 Franco Manca restaurants and 25 Pizza Pilgrims sites across the UK.
“When we first launched in the UK 10 years ago, the variety of pizza available was limited (Italian or not Italian!),” says Matteo Aloe, co-founder of popular Italian chain Berberè (which now has 21 locations across Italy and three in London). “Now there’s a whole new movement: crispy, New York style, pies, and this is such a positive change. It’s not true that Italians do it better and the UK is demonstrating new ways to approach pizza making.”
As Tony Naylor detailed in a January 2024 article for the Guardian, pizza’s popularity has endured, even during a particularly tough period for hospitality. The affordability, customisability (you can easily make pizza gluten-free, halal and vegan), and versatility (it can be served in restaurants, pubs and entertainment venues, as well as for takeaway and delivery) of the dish has allowed the pizza scene to flourish. Last year we also detailed the Italian-American trend that swept London, resulting in a proliferation of regional US pizza styles in the city.
There’s NYC-style pizza – wider and crispier with large, triangular, floppy, foldable slices – which you can get at the likes of Gordos, Alley Cats, Crisp Pizza, 67 Sourdough, Bad Boy Pizza Society, Spring Street Pizza, and the newly-returned All Kaps. You can get the crispy, charred and less cheesy New Haven-style pizza, aka abeetz, at Lenny’s Apizza in north London.
The thick, bready rectangular Detroit-style pies, derived from Sicilian-style pizza or sfincione and cooked in blue steel pans originally used in the city’s automotive factories, are available at Detroit Pizza, and Ria’s. Bing Bong Pizza, running out of You Call the Shots in Hackney, is doing grandma-style, which is baked in an oil pan but is thinner than Sicilian and Detroit pies.
If you like Chicago-style deep dish, Neil Rankin is slinging his version, “a combination of pizzas from my childhood, like the old-school deep dish Pizza Hut and Chicago Town frozen pizzas…but it also has a lot in common with the modern Detroit-style pies like the ones served in places like Emmy Squared in NYC” at Little Earthquakes the Railway Tavern in Dalston. If you like ultra thin and crispy slices, you can find Chicago’s other style, the almost cracker-like tavern-style pizza, at Short Road. And, of course, Italian pizza hasn’t gone anywhere. Santa Maria, Theo’s and 081 Pizzeria are flying the flag for Neapolitan pizza; you can get Roman slices at Forno; and Jack’s Pizzas is popping up around town doing Sicilian-style squares.
Clearly it’s a golden age for pizza in London. For Neil Rankin, it “feels reminiscent of the burger scene coming through in the early 2000’s – it’s definitely the best time for pizza we’ve had.” Rich Goodwin, who operates Bing Bong Pizza agrees, citing the variety, “New York, Neapolitan, Neo-politan, New Haven, Tavern, Deep Dish, Detroit, Sicilian, Grandma, and Roman (both types!) appetites are all catered for.” As well the variety, “it’s all being done in a more artisanal, high-quality way that’s pretty unique compared to other cities,” explains Sam Clowes of Bad Boy Pizza Society. Tom Vincent, the man behind Vincenzo’s in Bushey, thinks “we might have the best pizza in the world.”
What’s behind this boom? Firstly, pizza is a great vehicle for cooks to work with. As Alim Nayil of Kingston’s Patio Pizza points out, “pizza is an edible plate that you can pick up and eat with your hands. It’s perfect to showcase quality produce in an approachable manner”. Secondly, there’s a particular type of venue, something that London has in abundance, that has provided great springboards for brands working across different pizza styles – the pub.
Over the last few years, pubs have proved to be popular homes for a host of new pizza concepts, including Short Road, Little Earthquakes, Crisp, Dough Hands, Lenny’s Apizza, and Bad Boy Pizza Society. The residency model is less risky for operators than taking on their own brick-and-mortar sites, meaning the focus is on the food. “The Three Colts are a great example of this, they have helped launch Dough Hands, 75 Slices and now Short Road,” say Gerado and Paolo of food review account Bite Twice.
The built-in audience that comes with a pub massively helps the resident brand. Carl McCluskey, who runs the insanely popular Crisp Pizza out of The Chancellors in Hammersmith, says the community aspect of the pub has also had a huge impact, “we still have our regulars who have been drinking in the pub since I was a baby mixing with people coming from all over the world.” Crucially though, a pizza kitchen doesn’t disrupt the harmony of the venue. It doesn’t turn the pub into a restaurant, so regulars can still go in to drink. And if you get a bit peckish after a couple of pints, there’s nothing better to eat than a pizza – you don’t need cutlery, it’s easy to share, it’s savoury, it’s filling, it tastes good cold, and, according to the Bite Twice boys, “even better after a few beers.”
Even operators who didn’t start their journey in a pub, like Dinner for One Hundred, have been making use of what these venues can offer, running the kitchens at The Perseverance in Bloomsbury and Hootananny in Brixton.
The pizza scene in the city has become so vibrant that people are now talking about ‘London pizza’ or ‘London-style’ pizza. It’s actually not a new term. In 2019 Foodism asked “Is there such a thing as ‘London pizza’?”, when more interesting flavours and topping combinations (rather than dough styles or bake times) were becoming more prevalent, as an expression of the diversity of food in London. Places like Homeslice and Crate have always put less traditional toppings, like curried minced lamb and sweet potato, on their pizzas, and Yard Sale has done cheeseburger, kebab and curry collab pizzas with the likes of Bleecker, Mangal II and Tayyabs.
Now ‘London-style’ pizza is back and it’s the buzzword of the moment, being applied to brands like Dough Hands, Vincenzo’s, ACE Pizza and Gracey’s Pizza (who’s actually in St Albans). There’s no accepted definition of what makes up a ‘London-style’ pizza, and in fact, many operators are reluctant to use the term at all – Carl from Crisp certainly isn’t a fan of it, and Tom of Vincenzo’s calls it a myth.
Let’s try and break it down. ‘London-style’ borrows from a number of distinctive Italian and American styles. As Tom Kemble of the newly-opened Spring Street Pizza in Borough, says, “it’s a mish-mash of people being inspired by Neapolitan pizza, people being inspired by New York, by New Haven abeetz-style pizza, by Roman style pizza and then finding their own style.” The Bite Twice guys go further, stating “it has the aesthetic, juiciness and ingredient quality of a Neapolitan, it has the crisp and charred dough flavour of Romana and New Haven and the structural integrity, crunch and visual impressiveness of a New York”. There also seems to be some similarities with dough make-up, topping ingredients, oven types and cooking times across pizzas that have been dubbed ‘London-style’.
For Ugo Galelli, founder of Short Road Pizza (an Italian making his own take on thin and crispy pizza in London), “the dough tends to start with a Neapolitan-style base: high-ish hydration, strong flours, a touch of olive oil” for a ‘London-style’ pizza. He uses biga, (an Italian pre-ferment) to add complexity and chew whilst still resulting in a light and crispy pizza. The use of electric, rather than gas or wood-fired, ovens is where more of the American influence comes through, and as Hannah Drye from Dough Hands explains, “generally it’s a lower, slower bake. It’s a crispier pizza.” However, she’s keen to point out that the crispness doesn’t automatically mean that the pizza has to be super thin, pointing to the likes of Breadstall, which does a thicker crust than herself or Short Road do, but are still getting called ‘London-style’. Breadstall, run by Sebastian Vince, is similar to Vincenzo’s in that they do the big, crispy pies that you’re more likely to find in New York. He uses a biga dough for his pizzas and has found that the ‘New York’ style vodka sauce is one of the bestsellers at his Soho site.
There’s also some consensus on toppings. “We are closer to Naples in that we’ve got the tomatoes from there, we’re using organic flour that we’re getting from Italy,” says Tom Vincent. Ugo uses San Marzano tomatoes at Short Road as well as “the stuff that’s become almost symbolic of the London style — burrata, good meats, and rivers of hot honey.” At Dough Hands, Hannah sources Cobble Lane meats for her pizzas, and her bestseller by a mile is the Joad, topped with ‘nduja, stracciatella, hot honey and basil. James Fox, a Dough Hands alum who now has his own concept Fresh Hot Pizza, also uses biga in the dough for his pies and tops them with Cobble Lane pepperoni and hot honey. “I would never call my pizza ‘London-style’,” he says. “But I think in terms of what people are calling ‘London-style’ it probably is, that thin and crispy, not too hard on any one style in particular, so if that’s ‘London-style’ then maybe that’s what I’m doing.”
Ultimately, there are no hard and fast rules, like Neapolitan pizza would have, when it comes to ‘London-style’ pizza. “I wouldn’t call it a proper ‘style’ – not in the same way as something that’s got 100 years of tradition behind it,” says Sam from BBPS. It’s the freedom and fluidity that comes from that lack of tradition, and using the ingredients and equipment that you have available to you, that really defines ‘London-style’.
As Seb from Breadstall puts it, “it’s more of an attitude, I think that attitude is defined as people doing their own thing, their own style and sticking to that style, and saying we’re not going to try and copy this, this and this.” For Alim, ‘London-style’ “means rejecting traditional pizza rules, and making a pizza that looks good, but more importantly, tastes good.” Hannah agrees that it’s a movement, one that “is making pizza that doesn’t necessarily fall under any other bracket, you’re just taking elements from pizzas that you like, menu items that you like”.
So what is ‘London-style’ pizza? Anything you want it to be, plus a drizzle of hot honey.
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