NAP - Authentic Pizza in Lavapies
Everyone loves a pizza right? Where can one find one of Italy's most famous exports in Madrid? Everyone has their opinion, but many agree that NAP Lavapies serves authentic Pizza and they have been open for just over a year now if memory serves me. Last Saturday my wife and I finally managed to get in to NAP Lavapies on a Saturday night for Pizza.
We just had to make the effort to get there by about 9 pm!
NAP often gets mentioned on here as the best pizza in Madrid, their branch in Barcelona was definitely the best Pizza in Barcelona at the time and they would use sourdough so it was a bit different and distinctive.
We’ve tried several times to get in as we’re in Lavapies at least once a month on Saturday with Madrid wine club and by the time I’ve finished sorting that out we usually get to NAP by 930pm and there’s a 20 to 30 minute wait for a table.
Anyway to cut to the chase. We ordered:-
- Melanzane Parmigiana - 4,90€ (aubergines with cheese and tomato sauce)
- Pizza Quattro Stagioni - 8,80€
- Pizza Diavola - 9,20€
- Triamisu to share for dessert - 3,90€
- A few bottles of water - 2,00€ each, coca cola was the same price.
PROS
- All the food was very nice and made with quality ingredients.
- The prices are great.
- Service was not bad and fairly quick, we ordered a starter and they had to ask us if we were ready for the pizza. It seems that the pizzas only take 50 seconds to cook in their wood burning oven.
- Pizzas are stone baked.
- The kinda place you go with your young friends for cheap food and alcohol, very casual.
CONS
- No bottles of Italian wine, only house wine by the glass (they don’t want you spending ages here)
- Diavola pizza was a bit lacking in meat and spiciness, definitely have had better Diavola pizzas in Spain.
- Would have preferred the bread with the starter to have been toasted so I could dip it into the melted cheese and tomato.
- Pizzas from NAP especially when I lived in Barcelona and would go used to be sour dough, now that seems to have changed, so the base isn’t as unique as it used to be and as such there are other places in Madrid that also do stone baked pizza so it’s probably not worth the trip unless you’re near one. We thought the pizzas were good but not necessarily the best in Madrid.
- Tiramisu was mostly cream, it bares little resemblance to an authentic traditional tiramisu.
CONCLUSION
Great cheap place to go and eat well for the money, not as unique as it used to be, hope it doesn’t go downhill. I’d go back again and still recommend it, I’d definitely have a different pizza next time, perhaps one of their slightly more expensive looking offerings with truffle oil. Stonebaked pizzas made in wood burning ovens are not for everyone, it's normal that there will be some ash at the bottom of the pizza and some bits can get slightly burnt. There are many styles of pizza, ones that are more crispy, others that are thicker New York Style so it's good to try a few different places with a few different styles to see what you like. Go somewhere else for dessert.
Contact Details
Calle del Ave María, 19, 28012 Madrid - It's on the border of Anton Martin and Lavapies which are the 2 nearest metro stops.
Pretty sure they don't take reservations but they supply a phone number!
Phone: 911 25 07 42
You can follow them on Facebook and with Instagram Tag #pizzerieNAP