Pizza + Wylam Brewery = I’m there.
Wylam Brewery (Exhibition Park, NE2 4PZ) again teamed up with 44 Events for the latest in a series of themed-food + tinnies events last week. Following burgers, curries, Thai, and more, the focus this time was on pizza, with a loose Star Wars theme. And several awful The Force/Skywalker puns, natch.
It’s the first of these events we’ve been to for a while after reports of chunky queues, silly cash payments, some ‘meh’ scran etc. but with a promise of lots of upgrades and a dozen pizza peddlers including some of the regions big fish, you can’t really go wrong.
The majestic Wylam Brewery remains one of my favourite places in town for obvious reasons (more on that here) and the sun seems to have finally reared its head so we went along on Friday for an afternoon sesh. Like the rest of the sister events, food is on a token system — here, £4 a slice which isn’t daft — it just seems to be the price of a the slice of a pizza at the moment in this country we call home.
Anyway, really quick round-up of what I ate and liked:
Favourite: Wildfire Pizza
Turns out the squares are just as quality as the Neapolitan pies we had a little while ago. The Properoni which the Wildfire gang use is just the de facto for me now, and with a bit of pesto and a lot of parmesan this was my perhaps surprise pick, but it’s just so good. Wet and sloppy, with all of those key pizza flavours that wallop you around the face, the Sunderland squad are smashing it right now.
Best of the rest…
I bought this honestly thinking it was a slice with crumbled burger, so when it turned out to be a wee slider I was a little disappointed but CHRIST that’s a good burger. Have a peep at the ONE insta page for more like this wish-it-was-bigger pattie with pineapple chutney, nduja and house-made bun. Defo seeking these guys out for another soon.
Interesting diversion but still a banger as expected by the Scream for Pizza gals in the shape of Hens Solo. They’ve got their dough nailed at the mo. And I never knew I needed pickles on a pizza ’til now.
Fire & Dough have seriously upped their game since I last had one as well, this was as good as any Neapolitan I’ve had recently. Most importantly, a textbook dough, light as owt. They ended up winning (by quantity of slices sold), so fair enough.
Special shout out
For the latest By the River Brew Co. session IPA. It’s not as if a supremely slurplable session beer from Wylam/By the River is a rarity but this was especially good. Follow the Sun (Citra IPA) has been the standout smasher of the year so far for me but this has a bit of a softer edge and I can imagine absolute buckets and buckets of it being sold at BTR this summer. And if nothing else, you gotta love the artwork.
Everything else
With a dozen vendors, you’ve gotta be absolutely clamming to get round all of them so apologies to Noshbox, Gingerinos, Dou_h & Co. & Mivesi who I couldn’t fit in. But otherwise (and I’ll let you connect the dots…) you’ve got:
— a decent but not-quite-Wildfire square which is no different to what the main gaff in town offers
— a bang average slice with not much to say about it (made better at home TBH)
— another bang average slice, saved by some of Charlotte’s Butchery’s best Italian
— a plucky duck slice that was good flavour-wise but pre-cooked and the base suffered for it
Slice Wars is always a fun event and as ever with Wylam you don’t get too many dickheads around. In fact I’d say there were more families than anything on the Friday night we visited but I do wonder where all the STACK whoppers mourning the loss of their Mecca will end up in town though 🧐
Until next time, Wylam 🙌🏻
Related Posts
