Basilico takeaway pizza

15/10/06

I had heard these were the best takeaway pizzas available. Naturally, I felt we had to sample some. We chose an Americana (italian spicy pepperoni, green and red bell peppers, spring onion chopped tomatoes, jalapeno peppers and mozzarella) with pineapple substituted for the jalapeno peppers - I love pineapple on pizza - and a Roma (tomato, buffalo mozzarella, grilled aubergine, rocket, parmesan, pesto and prosciutto crudo). I really didn't like the Roma - I can never understand the popularity of ham varieties on pizza, and the prosciutto crudo just wasn't very nice. And the aubergine was hard and fairly unpleasant - had it been cut along its width rather than length, the rather thick skin might not have overpowered the flesh so much. The rest of that pizza was ok. The Americana was pretty good. But both were very sloppy and messy to eat. They had thin, floury bases, black from the pizza oven, and crusts that were so tough they weren't worth the effort to eat. But the tomato sauce was obviously made from real tomatoes and appeared fresh - it had chunks, which was a nice surprise. The rest of the ingredients seemed to be of good quality. But, like all takeaway pizzas, at around £11.50 a pizza the Basilico seem rather expensive for what you get. Disappointing.