Talking Italian

Santaniello 9-11 Newnham Street, Bedford MK40 3JR

Ah the weekend, those 2 days at the end of each week (the name gives it away!) that we all look forward to. A couple of days where we can forget the stresses of work, relax, go on trips or just concentrate on the stresses of home life instead!

Yes, Saturday was here and I was up early(ish) as I had a job to do, a job I had been putting off for some time as I’d never done it before and wasn’t looking forward to doing it either… WALLPAPERING!

As it turns out, apart from the nightmare of trimming the bastard stuff once it’s on the wall the actual job itself was quite frankly a piece of piss! Sadly this now means that Mrs Belly knows I can wallpaper and therefore (I’m sure) will be already planning my next wallpapering project as I type.

Anyway, wallpapering out of the way and a lack of desire to cook anything I thought “Let’s get a pizza”. As you know by now the whole reason I started this thing was to name and shame those shitty Pizza joints that do the bog standard skanky pizza’s that have sadly become the norm in this country. Places such as Bella Italia in Kempston, Andrea’s in Bedford Town Centre etc.

Santaniello is a classic Italian Pizzeria run by an Italian family making classic Italian Pizza’s, this is how Pizza should be! There are only a handful of Places in Beds that serve proper Pizza and it’s such a nice change from the usual muck!

Proper Italian base, proper tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese, none of your dirty cheddar mix here!

I had myself a salami & chilli Calzone while Mrs Belly had herself an onion & mushroom pizza and we also ordered a mixed salad between us. Both Pizza & Calzone were a good size (there’s just one size here approx. 12”), cooked perfectly and also fast. I placed the order on the phone and they asked how long I would be, I asked how long they would like me to be and they told me 5 minutes.

We were just round the corner and got there pretty much 5 minutes later; they were literally just taking our order out of the oven!

Both of them were delicious and the drive home didn’t affect the food in any way, the dough was crisp, the cheese was stringy and the food was still hot! The salad came in an Italian dressing which was pretty damn good too.

In all honesty there’s not a whole load to say when food is good, if it’s bad then there’s plenty to say but when food is good all that really comes to mind are three things:

1) Yum
2) Mmmm nyom nyom
3) We are definitely going back there!

The menu is nice and simple; you won’t find chicken or pineapple on the Pizza’s here because they’re not things real Italians put on pizzas. Salami, Ham, Mushrooms, Onions, Olives, Peppers, Chilli’s, Artichokes, Anchovies, these are the kind of toppings you’ll find. Simple, flavoursome ingredients; that’s how Italian is and to be honest it’s all the better for it!

The only downside is that they don’t deliver but the only time that’s really an issue is if either:

A) Everyone’s drunk and you live out of Bedford Town Centre

You live outside of Bedford Town Centre but don’t own a car

If you want to taste a real Italian pizza then I suggest you stop calling up all the fakers, get off your ass and head to Santaniello. Find out what real pizza tastes like then give your skanky 10 a penny take away all kinds of shit until we’ve forced them all to start selling quality pizzas the way they are meant to be!