Adagio

Venue: Adagio, Greek Street

Food: Pizza

Cost: By the weight (£4-6)

Rating: 75%

www.adagio-pizza.com

After what seems like months of delaying tactics, I finally took the short walk (with AJ) to Adagio on Greek Street. When the idea of Grabalunch was first swimming around my mind, Adagio was Soho’s newest player on the pizza scene, accosting me on my way past with free samples and pleas to step inside, but I had always wanted to experience it properly. So long has gone by that it is now becoming a Soho institution and growing franchise.

At the outset I must say that it was worth the wait. An incredible range of pizza al Taglio (the glamorous phrase for ‘baked in large rectangular trays’), clearly produced with much thought, care and invention in terms of ingredient combinations.  The pizza looks, feels, smells and most importantly tastes authentic.

However, Adagio prices its pizza by the weight, and as I had predicted this represented both its appeal and biggest problem. Appeal in that I could order three distinct 100g slices of alluring pizza, but a problem in that 300g is both expensive (over £6) and the very minimum amount an above average eater such as myself requires. I concede a regular diner could suffice with two slices for around £4.

On the other hand they do offer a free drink for orders above £5, which certainly seems a shrewd marketing tactic, and a loyalty card always goes down well in my book.

I took great pleasure in spending a good 5-6 minutes pacing the length of the counter to take in the full range of options available to me. I hope the (very attentive) staff assumed I was indecisive, but fear they just assumed slightly strange. Adagio is also not the biggest shop; so a few customers may have been equally confused by such behaviour. But for a first time, it was necessary.

In conclusion, a fantastic food offering, but one where the customer must be prepared to spend for quality and volume. I could recommend my favourite pizza to you, but I feel the joy is to choose based on look and individual instinct and I would not want to spoil that for you!

Taste 9

Portion size 6

Service 6

Speed 7

Originality 9

Choice 10

Workability 7

Office response 9

Value for money 4

Brand 8

Overall: 75%