We were at a loose end on a Sunday and I was in the mood for pizza. Browsing the internet, Michael suggested we try a newbie like Queen Margaret or The Moor's Head, but I was in the mood for something less refined. With Plush Pizza now just a wistful memory, I convinced Michael that we should revisit Eat Pizza - it offers the suburban Aussie toppings I had a hankering for.
Eat Pizza's basic menu is pretty typical - Hawaiian, Capricciosa and Meat lovers pizzas, gourmet chicken, meat and seafood options, garlic bread, a few pastas, salads and desserts. So's the decor - toppings and oven visible from the counter, plastic furniture for those choosing to eat in, and the TV in the corner was blaring a fawning celebrity interview on 60 Minutes. The big draws for us pesky-tarians are the gluten free bases (which K gives a coeliac thumbs-up), vegan cheese, vegan salami and vegan ham that can be substituted for a few extra dollars. Despite the veg*n bent of online reviews, it would seem that we don't form the bulk of Eat Pizza's customers. Our friendly cashier looked unpractised at entering our veg-adapted orders into the register, eventually correcting the dockets by hand.
The "Fresh and Healthier Way!" tagline is curious. While they previously advertised wholemeal bases, there's no hint of them on the current Eat Pizza menu. (We're not sure whether wholemeal is now the only base offered or it's instead disappeared.) An Emma & Tom's ad was perched in the dining area, yet the fridge was stocked with sugar-laden sodas, 'vitamin waters' and icecream.
The "Fresh and Healthier Way!" tagline is curious. While they previously advertised wholemeal bases, there's no hint of them on the current Eat Pizza menu. (We're not sure whether wholemeal is now the only base offered or it's instead disappeared.) An Emma & Tom's ad was perched in the dining area, yet the fridge was stocked with sugar-laden sodas, 'vitamin waters' and icecream.
Never mind. We were here for pizza. Michael's Vegie Delight (medium $12) with vegan salami ($2.50 extra), was a little charred and laden with tomato sauce, eggplant, pumpkin cubes, roast capsicum, semi dried tomatoes and fetta. He loved it in all its semi-gourmet glory.
My small Hawaiian pizza ($8 + $2 for vegan ham) took a little longer to arrive. Worse, it arrived with real ham. Once we cleared up the misunderstanding the staff were very apologetic and whipped up a replacement promptly, serving it with a garnish of rocket and a second sincere apology.
This pizza was everything I wanted - sweet, juicy canned pineapple, salty 'ham' and judiciously portioned mozzarella and tomato sauce on a medium-thick not-too-oily base. The stuff of an Aussie childhood.
It's awesome that Eat Pizza extend that Aussie-style pizza experience to veg*ns and the gluten-intolerant. Just be careful to double-check your order up-front!
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You can read about our first experience with Eat Pizza here; that same evening was also blogged on Lisa Dempster and The Fairest Feed. Since then they've impressed more of the veg community, including Vicki Vegan (who visited the Glenroy store), In the Mood for Noodles (twice), and Around The World Vegan. There's a more ambivalent review on Eat More Vegies.
The only omni review I found is on Footscray Food Blog; another rave.
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Eat Pizza
44 Raleigh Rd, Maribyrnong (other stores in Footscray and Glenroy)
9317 7977
veg pizzas $6-15, with extras $2-3 each
http://www.eatpizza.com.au/
Accessibility: There's a small step on entry but plenty of room inside. It's very loud, even in the absence of other customers. Ordering and payment takes place at a low counter. Toilets are gendered but flat and roomy.
Plush Pizza has CLOSED? Oh my goodness, that is saaaaad. Their pizzas were so damn good, and... Australian-style?
ReplyDeleteAlso - real ham arriving on a pizza? That's pretty unforgivable as far as I'm concerned.. It's fantastic that restaurants etc are using vegan meats, etc, but... they *have* to have processes in place to make sure that doesn't happen, because many people eating vegan aren't going to be well-versed enough to even notice! Scary.
The pizza looks great and I'm happy there's another gf option for when I visit Melbourne again!
ReplyDeleteHow did you know it was real ham?! It's always my fear when ordering fake meat that it'll accidentally be real meat :S Scary!
ReplyDeleteI miss Plush SO MUCH.
ReplyDeleteThe real-meat-eating thing has happened to me before at restaurants - it's just the worst because with certain foods the only way you find out is after biting in :(
I love that place so much. We went there one time to try it, and it sort of became our go-to place, meaning the most exciting and romantic dinner date we had for about 6 months was sitting in a park, staring at the dirty Maribyrnong river, stuffing pizza into our gobs.
ReplyDeleteIts funny, they often have new guys who are confused about the vegan stuff, but if you go often there's an older guy (owner?) who learns who you are and what you want. I never had any issues, but it did take a little pursuading at first (one guy, on the phone, aked me if I wanted meat on my veg pizza with vegan cheese).
Mattheworbit - yes, sadly Plush is no more. I've never seen topping combinations so good anywhere else. :-(
ReplyDeleteMandee - they're a bit out of town but right on the tram line. K tells me they deliver to her place so let's have a pizza party. :-D
vegiebug - it had streaks of fat unlike any I've seen in fake ham, so I checked with the cook - he told me the truth, and apologised profusely for the mistake.
Louise - yeah, we've had too-late meat mistakes too. It was the difficulties in ordering that made me extra vigilant on this occasion.
Keira - thanks for sharing your tips as a regular customer! The staff were really friendly and it won't put me off returning, I'll just double-check the order. And I'm totally in favour of low-brow dinner dates. :-)