Back in the 1990's a young man by the name of Valentine Warner indulged his love of pizza by working as a waiter in his local PizzaExpress restaurant. Fast forward two decades and Valentine is back at PizzaExpress, this time working in the kitchen designing two new pizzas for the menu.
Valentine's obsession with seasonality, combined with his adventurous attitude to food has contributed to the concepts behind PizzaExpress's latest menu additions. Last night Hot Dinners was invited down to one of the restaurant’s flagship branches in Central London to sample his creations.
The first new pizza on offer is a bold-flavoured Puttanesca, a deliciously light and crispy base topped with passata, anchovies, capers, olives, fresh chillies, lemon juice, garlic oil and finished off with a sprinkling of fresh oregano. Packing a punch with the flavours, this was our favourite of the two.
The second is a fennel-lover's dream, with fennel salami, fennel seeds, mozzarella and finished off with fresh fennel, grana padano, rocket and a drizzle of lemon oil.
When we asked PizzaExpress's founder Peter Boizot how the partnership with Valentine came about he put it simply: "Valentine loves pizza. We make pizza. It’s the perfect partnership.”
Valentine’s pizzas will be on the menu at PizzaExpress, nationwide, from Tuesday 24th April 2012, and will feature through spring and summer, until September.
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