Last week, Brad and I were lucky enough to be invited to a launch event for Aldo Zilli’s new pizza range at Prezzo Restaurant, Haymarket. Not one to turn down a free pizza and drinks, we went along. 

Despite there being 145 Prezzo’s around London, neither of us had ever been before as the restaurants aren’t located either neither where we work or where we live in East London. One good thing was that we didn’t have any pre-concieved notions of what the food would be like. However, I was familiar with Aldo Zilli, whose name appears on a number of his own restaurants around London and has been on quite a few telly programs. Aldo worked with Prezzo Executive Chef, Paul Lewis, to develop the five pizzas in the range. Unfortunately I was too shy to have too much of a chat with the chefs! I wish I’d asked them for some tips on how to make such brilliant pizza bases.

On first glance, the Prezzo in Haymarket looks like a classier version of either Pizza Express or Strada. The tables had been cleared aside upstairs to allow the the guests to mingle and chat over some prosecco — or beer — plus sample the pizzas as they came out of the oven. There was five pizzas in total — Vegetarian, Neapolitana, Seafood and Meat plus a Half-n-Half made up of Meat and Vegetarian. We managed to try them all and they were excellent, especially fresh out of the oven. 

We tried the vegetarian first. The pizza itself was topped with fresh grilled vegetables and fresh spinach and pesto was added once it was cooked. With a crispy base and not too much cheese, this felt like a rather healthy pizza. The Neapolitana continued in this vein, again feeling very fresh and light. 

The Meat pizza was an interesting one. A base of tomato sauce was topped with spicy salami and cheese. Once the pizza had been cooked it was topped with a bunch of rocket wrapped with prosciutto, then drizzled with a vinegar based dressing. Brad found the dressing to be an odd combination with the toppings but I would be quite happy to get the meat pizza and simply eat the prosciutto and rocket separately from the pizza. 

The Seafood pizza was the biggest surprise, neither of us are big fans of seafood and it’s something we probably never would have ordered but this was amazing. Fresh squid and prawns with spinach. There was a hint of lemon which balanced it all quite nicely. 

The pizzas themselves cost around just under £11 and £12 each which is definitely reasonable given the cost of pizzas generally. The size is quite generous too, as you can see from the press shots above. I’m certainly a convert and would definitely pick Prezzo over other Italian chains. For some more photos - check out my set on Flickr.

Prezzo Restaurant
Kinghouse, 8-10 Haymarket
London SW1Y 4BP
Phone: +44(0)2078391129
http://www.prezzorestaurants.co.uk/