Baz and Fred's Pizza, Flat Iron Square, London: restaurant review

We arrived at 6pm, and the market was packed with city workers having a pint after work and friends catching up over bowls of ramen. Baz and Fred’s is hard to miss, with pizza illuminated on the white tiled wall. The team are happy to chat you through the menu and explain their unique oven.

The menu is short, with five options plus a special, and are mostly meat focused, with only one veggie option. Choose between a classic tomato and mozzarella; a spicy chorizo, ‘ndjua and mozzarella; a Napoli salami, pesto, chilli and mozzarella; a prosciutto, Portobello mushroom and mozzarella; or goat’s cheese, caramelised onion, rocket and balsamic. There’s only San Pellegrino (blood orange or lemon) on offer to drink, but you can order something stronger, should you wish, at the bar opposite.

Dough is proved for 48-72 hours, which results in a crunchy crust and fluffy centre. The sauce - smooth and rich with a slight sweetness is made from Italian tomatoes. Prosciutto, ‘nduja and chorizo are also sourced from Italy. Each pizza is served on paper plates - and if you want cutlery, wooden sets are available - but if you want to just dig in and eat it with your hands, you’ll feel quite at home here.

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On the goat’s cheese, caramelised onion, rocket and balsamic pizza, the cheese was tangy but not too overpowering, so the sticky sweet caramelised onions still shone through. On both pizzas, the ratio of fresh rocket to other toppings was a little too much for us, though.

At Baz and Fred’s, pizzas are cooked in a Chadwick Oven (designed by Baz’s godfather). A Chadwick Oven is a modern interpretation of an ancient terracotta oven, it sits on top of a domestic gas ring and reaches temperatures of 500°C, cooking pizzas in under four minutes. Ours took around 15 minutes to arrive, but with a long queue and only a few ovens on the go, we reckon that’s still pretty quick.

The goat’s cheese pizza maintained its crusty base to the centre, but the prosciutto version was heavy with the toppings. When it got to the centre it was slightly sloppy, Naples-style, which is fine if you’re prepared for the mess.

Two sauces are available to dip any leftover crusts in. Garlic mayo was tangy and sweet with a smooth texture to soften the crunchy crust, while chilli oil was pungent.

There aren’t any desserts on the menu, but if you want to end on something sweet, grab a cinnamon-poached pineapple pancake from Where The Pancakes Are just around the corner.

The well-balanced prosciutto, Portobello mushrooms, mozzarella, rocket and garlic parsley oil. The base was not too salty, so when topped with prosciutto there was a good balance of salty and sweet.

Price range: Pizzas range from £7 to £9.50 for an 11-incher.

Date of the review: Friday 29th June

bazfred.com