Roberto Pizza

I realized last week that a year has passed since the idea of creating this pizza review blog came up. It was a year ago I ate at Anthony's Pizza, searching for a half decent Neapolitan style pizza in this city. I didn't find it at Anthony's, so my search brought me a year later to Roberto Pizza.

In celebration of another lap around the sun, on a lazy weekday afternoon off, I headed to lunch at Roberto Pizza in Little Italy. It's a cute little place with just a handful of tables, with a fairly simple menu featuring a few starters and about a dozen pizza choices. I weighed my options between two and ended going super simple with the margherita. Remember, you can judge a pizza place best by sampling its "plain". 

While I was waiting for my pizza to arrive (it came very quickly, by the way), I spied on the two guys at the table next to me dig in. I watched in horror as the one guy sawed through what looked like rock hard crust with his serrated knife. "No, no, no", I thought. Crust should not be crunchy like that!

When mine arrived I went straight for the crust and I was relieved to find it was not as hard as I expected. The pizza was a challenge to cut on a plate that was not much bigger than the pie itself, so after a few feeble attempts and nearly flinging my pizza in my lap, I picked it up and went for it. 

Truthfully I didn't get what I always hope for when I eat a Neapolitan style pizza - a pillowy soft crust. But what I did get was pretty darn decent for this town. The flavour of the cheese and sauce was quite good. Apparently they use bocconcini which is an odd choice, but it worked out for them. Have you ever snacked on a plain bocconcini without marinading or salting it? It's tasteless. But paired with the simple tomato sauce it really worked. I can only imagine they properly salted or otherwise flavoured it somehow.

The crust had some parts that were a little tough but the majority of it was not bad. A little under flavoured and not as beautifully soft as its Italian counterparts, but in terms of what I've found in Ottawa, definitely a front runner. They also provided chilli oil which helped add flavour and heat. I admit I ate way too much of it after I had drank all my water, too.

My husband got the Caterina pizza and raved about it. I'm curious to know what cheese they used on this one since it appears very different than mine. You can even see that his crust looks a little more uniform in its thickness than mine, so less crunchy bits. That probably explains the poor guy beside me too!

This is a sit down place and the personal size pizza (yes, I finished it) was $14.25.  It was the cheapest and they range up to $19. All in all this is a good pizza that I really enjoyed and would be happy to eat again.

I've rated Roberto Pizza six and a half out of eight slices. 

Leave a comment with your opinion, or your thoughts on Roberto, and let me know where I should hit up next!

Ciao,
Pizza Lover