Alley Cats Pizza Chelsea — Restaurant in London

Very good pizza and starters, you won't be disappointed. I'll start with the service, which was excellent. We had three different people serving us for some reason, doing different things. Each of them knew what they were doing at each point and were very professional.

The food itself is very good without maybe climbing onto the rung of excellence. First of all size wise a pizza is big enough for two. Maybe not two big men unless they get starters but certainly two average people. The pizza was very tasty. You can find better pizzas out there and I have reviewed them but Alley Cats is still delicious. I prefer a chewy crust to crispy and here it was crispy but it was not overly crispy so I enjoyed it. I would say this, and it's personal preference, but I think they could do with a few different pizzas to choose from.

The starters... We had the bacon, the crushed potatoes and the meatballs. I will say that they were all very nice but perhaps a bit too simple. You can make any of them at home very easily and they are definitely overpriced. £8 for a few rashers of bacon is taking the mick a bit. Still, tasty.

I think the biggest disappointment was the dips. We got the garlic mayo and the scotch bonnet. The scotch bonnet was not hot at all and resembled milk almost.

I cannot give them maximum marks but I would go back. It is pricey and in my opinion 'overpriced' is a word that would be applicable, but I guess that's what you get in Chelsea. £52 for two people and we didn't get...

The waitress who served us was absolutely the rudest waitress I have ever encountered. When we finished our pizzas she refused to show us the dessert menu. She told us there were 2 options tiramisu or ice cream. I asked what flavours of ice cream there were and she said only vanilla. Then my friend who had been before mentioned there were different toppings but she just dismissively said ‘yeh but it’s all vanilla but you can get toppings if you want” and still didn’t let us see the menu. After she walked away we decided we wouldn’t have dessert out of principle because it was obvious she was just trying to get us out of the restaurant as quick as possible despite the fact we had waited in the queue outside for an hour. She then brought the bill and I realised I needed to top up my card so asked for a minute to put money on it. As I was doing it she repeatedly leaned forward and tried to touch the card machine against my phone even though I had explained what I was doing. The way she did it was aggressive and exceptionally rude. I then said to her ‘excuse me you just have to wait a second’ and she rolled her eyes. By far the absolute rudest waitress I have ever come across. It infuriates me that she automatically gets a 12.5% tip and therefore thinks she can get away with being so obnoxious. Won’t be going back and if it was my restaurant I wouldn’t employ...

I had followed the original Alley Cats in Marylebone since its opening but was put off by the reports of long queues and never got around to visiting. The brand new location in Chelsea is much closer to home so I decided to risk it for a Sunday lunch on their opening weekend. I was surprised to find that there was no queue at all, in fact it was not even half full during the time I was there (12-1pm).

I ordered the halal version of their pepperoni pizza. It was the first order of the day and took around 20 min to prepare. It was a decent pizza. The crust had a nice crispness to it, and I did enjoy the accompanying garlic dip, although the Scotch bonnet one was far too mild. It is quite a heavy pizza and a lot for one person. I did find myself getting a bit bored of it towards the end when it was no longer warm. I also belatedly realised that they had forgotten to include the jalapeños and honey, which are listed as toppings on the menu. Unfortunately I had already finished my meal at this point.

Including a beer, I paid £31 for my meal. Overall a decent enough pizza but I couldn’t see what all the fuss was about. I live equal distance from Crisp Pizza in Hammersmith, and the latter is easily my top...