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Front page · Slice of Life Pizza

Toss, sauce, bake, slice (and a scoop of sorbet): Nonna Rosa's takeaway grows into a ristorante

It starts as a little takeaway with a wood-fired oven and a moped. It ends with tablecloths, chandeliers and a piano.

A perfect base, just out of the wood-fired oven.
A perfect base, just out of the wood-fired oven. Photo: our correspondent

Someone comes to the counter, or the phone rings, and the ticket shows what they want. Swipe up to toss the dough and tap as it comes down for a clean catch; a few tosses make a big base. Swirl on the sauce, then the cheese and toppings (some customers want them on one half only, or in a smiley face).

Bake it and watch through the oven mouth: take it out when it is golden, not pale and not burnt. Swipe across the middle to slice it evenly, and it is boxed. Deliveries go out on the moped, round the streets of Cosyford, while the pizza is still steaming hot.

Not every order is a pizza. Garlic bread starts as a slab of dough you press all over with your fingertips, then drizzle with garlic oil (it pools in the dimples), top with garlic, rosemary, tomatoes or olives, bake, and cut into fingers. And there is a freezer of sorbet (lemon, strawberry, mango, raspberry, mint and chocolate): roll a scoop round the tub, then drop it on the cone as it swings over the middle. Stack them in the order on the ticket, add sprinkles, sauce, a wafer or a cherry, and the customer walks off with it.

Do well and Nonna Rosa knocks through next door into a Pizzeria, with waiters bringing you orders from the dining room. Then comes the Ristorante Rosa, where you can wait tables yourself: seat the guests, take their orders, serve, and look out for birthdays, the food critic and the odd proposal.

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