Restaurant Review: Open Oven Pizza Co, Roche, Cornwall

Oh. My Goodness. Where to begin. Last week I was in Cornwall and had the most amazing cream tea ever, I thought right that’s my blog for the week sorted (who am I kidding, I definitely don’t post that often, I’m not organised enough for that) but then. But then, my friends, I went for pizza. Pizza in the oddest place one would go for pizza… pizza in a services…

Oh god. When our friends suggested it (they assured me they did gluten free) I felt my heart drop… surely no pizza place in a services, in Cornwall, is going to have a clue about cross contamination procedures. No matter, no matter, deal with it, you can only ask and then eat later if necessary. Deal with it Jess. Okay…

Now, to clarify, these services are newly built just off the A30 near Roche in Cornwall. They’re pretty snazzy as far as services go, there’s your standard petrol station, Holiday Inn, McDonalds, Costa and WHSmiths; there’s a Subway, a Cornish Pasty place, a gourmet hotdog place, a casino (for the motorway gamblers amongst us), and a pretty cool looking soft play area for the kids, as well as our Open Oven Pizza Co. The website for the services is here if you fancy any more information.

Back to the pizza… after looking at the menu, I chose a couple that I fancied, prepared to change in case of gluten containing toppings.

I spoke to the guy behind the counter who told me (with no hesitation) which pizzas I could and couldn’t eat, explained exactly why, then recommended I tried the 3 Cheese (Cornish blue, west country cheddar, and mozzarella) as that was his favourite. Done deal. Sounds lovely. Now for the overbearing coeliac routine… “Obviously, where I have coeliac disease, I’m concerned about cross contamination as the smallest amount of gluten can make me really unwell…”

Okay, well we use rice flour to roll out all of our pizzas so there’s no chance of airborne cross contamination at all.

HOLD UP. You said what?? Amazing. All pizzas are cooked and prepared on separate trays anyway apparently so theres no need to worry about that side of it either. This guy is on a roll, he really knows his stuff.

Now, I may or may not have gotten over excited and declared my love for him (with my other half standing right next to me) and the poor man promptly went bright red. But I’m only a little bit sorry for that, because he did make all of my pizza dreams come true. This pizza was the BEST goddamn pizza I have ever had in my memory. Ever. Gluten free or not. So there’s that.

It just looks like proper pizza doesn’t it.

Mmmmmm. I would have taken some more pictures of an individual slice and things but I was too busy eating devouring this goddess of a pizza. Sorry not sorry.

If (when) you go hunting for the holy grail of gluten free pizzas, the A30 Roche Services is the place to go, Open Oven Pizza Co is actually in the middle of the services so when you walk inside it’s straight in front of you. As I understand it, it’s just the one branch currently, but they’re planning on opening more in the area. Please, please go and check them out. I can’t recommend it enough.

Jx