Pizzeria Romano, Koramangala : Restaurant food review

Where is it: Opposite Forum (McDonald's side of Forum) there is a big road that goes down towards NGV. On that road, VLCC is on the right hand side... about 50 meters of VLCC there is a right turn (there is a shop called New Meena Cotton Sales exactly at the right turn). Turn right at New Meena Cotton Sales, about 300 meters down the road on the right side you will find Pizzeria Romano

What's special: Wood-fire and stone-oven baked thin crust pizzas

Pricing: A little on the higher side. A 10" wood-fire pizza costs between Rs 400-600

Ambiance & atmosphere: Pizzeria Romano is on the 1ft floor on top of a clothing store.
The entrance is not too promising and unfortunately looks more like it leads into one of those highly questionable seedy-looking dingy bars.

However things improve as you begin to climb up a narrow flight of stairs and see the walls plastered literally from floor to ceiling with posters of music bands and popular hollywood films. Now it looks more like a Hard Rock Cafe wannabe - a step up the food chain nevertheless from the dismal first impression.

Once inside things take a turn decidedly for the better. The place is surprisingly spacious and comprises of four different seating spaces almost like separate rooms to themselves. The wallpapered walls and the decor lend the place a dated yet classy up-market feel.


The music tends to majorly sampled from the Country genre. We found that a little amsusing considering its supposed to be serving authentic pizzas and tries to play up the "Italian-ness" of the place with pictures of Venice and Florence decorating the walls. They have a selection of Italian, French, Chilean and Australian wines on offer. However nothing too fancy and we weren't really expecting more considering this wasn't haute cuisine and really a fancier fast food joint we were at after all.


What we ordered: So the whole purported USP of the place was apparently the fact that they used a wood fired oven unlike most of the other establishments in Bangalore including the Dominoes and Pizza Huts. The theory is that the oven reaches temperatures of upto 900 degrees in this case and the heat that is produced is very dry which is perfect for quickly sealing in the flavours and the juices. Obviously , with such a build-up we had to order pizzas. We also ordered iced teas since it was quite hot.


The first item to arrive was the lemon iced tea. It did look visually appealing compared to a lot of the tripe that gets palmed off as iced teas around the city but as far as the taste goes it was just par for the course. The Rogue Elephant, also in the same locality serves a much better iced tea where they leave the tea out in the sun for several hours and that lends the drink a very unique tasty flavour.


The Veggie Supreme pizza was the next to arrive. Now, there had been quite a lot of build-up in our minds as we sat waiting for these "superior" wood-fire cooked pizzas. I am happy to say that we weren't disappointed. Having tasted an assortment of pizzas ranging from the local mom n pop shop guy who decides to add "pissa" to his menu, to the Dominos, to the Tajs, all the way upto the real deal in Milan I am happy to say that I quite liked Romano's version of this almost iconic food item. Was it the most authentic pizza I'd tasted. No. Was it the most technically perfect presentation. Nope. However the bottom-line was it tasted as good as any pizza I had ever had outside of Europe. The thin-crust was cooked just right and the pizza did have stronger flavours and the "juiciness" promised to us was definitely present.



The non-veg Joyride pizza (they have an entire range of "Rock" pizzas, another facet of their schizophrenic positioning) with sausages, bacon, salami and other meatilicious delicacies was next and it also hit all the right spots. The meat tasted wonderful and had a hint of smokiness that just doesn't exist in the 30 minutes home delivered pizza variant. The base was thin crust again and had exceptional texture and thickness yet again proving that the last one wasn't a lucky fluke. We did not try any of the other items as we had filled ourselves to the brim with the pizzas and were rather more inclined to get back to indulge in afternoon siestas like any self-respecting Italians would after a satisfying lunch!

Rating:




Excellent although a tad pricey. The "wood-fired" bit proved to be worth it instead of being a gimmick as we feared initially