If I have one food-related weakness, then it’s pizza. Never being one to turn down pizza, I recently popped along to try the vegan pizzas at Ecco Pizzeria in Roundhay, Leeds.
What’s the one food you can never resist?
Pizza without cheese is genuinely awesome and I even learned recently that the original pizza was cheese-free anyway (thanks to Nicole for sharing this nugget of information with me!). Having said that, the prospect of pizza with vegan cheese is one to get excited about.
Ecco Pizzeria in Headingley Leeds has been a favorite of mine for a little while now, due to their vegan cheese offering, creative topping combinations and delectable fresh bases. It’s also one place that both Pete and I can agree on immediately when we want to go out for a quick dinner. I was excited then to hear that Ecco Pizzeria were opening a new branch over in Roundhay and even more excited when they invited me along to try their vegan options.
Ecco Pizzeria in Roundhay is a slightly larger branch with a beautiful outdoor seating area, a light and airy ground floor and a cosy downstairs with additional seating. There’s also an extended menu that also includes pasta options. The pasta is all egg-free and there are some vegan sauce options available too. You’ll have to try those out for yourself though as I obviously went for the vegan pizza at Ecco Pizzeria on my visit!
Despite having threatened to rain all day, it miraculously stayed nice enough for us to sit outside the evening I popped down. It’s easy to adapt most of the options on the menu to create a vegan pizza at Ecco Pizzeria, so I ordered the ‘Athens’ pizza – a combination of fresh tomatoes, spinach, caremalised onions, black olives and oregano – with vegan cheese as an added extra for £1 more (and minus the feta the regular version comes with). The pizza was wonderful with very gooey dairy-free cheese, a good amount of toppings, and a base that was a little doughy and a little crispy in the right places. Pete opted for the ‘Athens’ in its standard vegetarian form and enjoyed his just as much. We also picked some mixed olives to start.
For drinks, we ordered two mocktails to go along with our food; I chose the ‘Elderflower Refresher’ and Pete went for the ‘Blueberry & Mint Cooler’. Although they were pretty, we did find them a bit too sweet for our tastes and wouldn’t order them again next time we visit Ecco Pizzeria.
Dessert, on the other hand, was good enough to rival the vegan pizza at Ecco Pizzeria. Ecco have four vegan dessert options on the menu: mango, lemon and raspberry “sorbetto” and a combination of all three topped with fresh fruit. As appealing as the last one sounded, I only had room for one scoop of sorbetto. Since Pete had decided on the raspberry (which would otherwise have been my first choice!), I went for the mango so we could try more than one flavor.
The sorbetto is like sorbet made with only fruit, water and sugar but so much creamier! Both flavours were delicious but the raspberry did win out. I would honestly put it up there as some of the best sorbet, if not the best, I’ve ever had.
Find out more about their two Leeds locations and the tasty vegan pizza at Ecco Pizzeria on their website.
