Takeaway Pizza

There’s no cutlery and no table service at Takeaway Pizza, the casual joint serving American-style slices to eat-in or take away. But it’s also a bar and late-night hangout serving wine by local producers and tropical cocktails.

The all-night slice menu has only four options – cheese, pepperoni, a meat pizza and a vegetarian pizza – but the whole-pizza list is more extensive and has a number of vegetarian options. You can order a gluten-free base, or vegan mozzarella for an extra $2. The regular pizza dough is fermented for three days and cooked into a thin base with crunchy edges.

Owners Sam and Tom Peasnell (brothers) and their mate Adam Goldblatt aren’t Italian, and they’re not pretending to be. They have a no-rules approach – the same that’s won them so many fans at Dexter, their American barbeque spot across the road.

Tomatoes are cold-smoked to maintain sweetness while adding smokiness; pastrami is cured in-house for 10 days, and then smoked. Another pizza is topped with that pastrami and shaved frozen bone marrow, a drizzle of meat sauce and spring onion.

The tiki-style cocktail list is centred on rum, mezcal and tequila. A 12-bottle wine list features enveloping-pushing, small-scale producers such Jamsheed and Alpha Box and Dice. The names rotate every month and have a focus on minimal-intervention and uncommon varietals.

When the sun goes down, candles are lit and the disco ball begins to turn, throwing dappled light on the floral wallpaper up back. The black and white harlequin-patterned floor and bar is made with second-hand tiles repurposed from another pizza shop.