Opened on the 8th August 2018, Noi Quattro is a smart enough setup, with the striking pizza ovens grabbing you to the left as you enter.  Straight away you're thrown into where the action happens.  We were plonked next to a window view seat, with the ledge adorned with cans of San Marzano tomatoes; the product used to make most great pizza sauces.  Long bodied, thin skinned tomatoes, grown in mineral rich volcanic soil at the foothills of Mount Vesuvius, for a super sweet flavour. It was a nice decorative touch, to remind you of what you're about to eat, and crucially, where it comes from.

The decor is a tad DIY looking in places, and the furniture felt a little café like too. But then they are an independent setup, so is that really a bad thing?

Now pizzas are notoriously cheap to make.  If you want an industry insider tip; that’s actually a big part of why there's so many about, and why they were first conceived, because their GP (Gross Profit) is massive percentage wise.  We went on a pizza pilgrimage to Naples a couple of years ago, and you regularly see great 10 to 12" Margheritas for about 4 quid.

However, we are not in Naples, and you don’t get pizzas anywhere for £4 unless it's from a box in the freezer aisle.  I reckon that even with quality flour, top end Mozzarella, the use of those comparatively pricy San Marzano tomatoes, nice basil and olive oil, the bulk-purchased produce used to make a good Margherita costs about 35p.  It's easy to see why banging out a pizza for £4 is very doable if you're constantly rammed and don’t have Mcr sized rents, utilities and wages to cover. 

Sadly, we have all of those in Manchester, so you're mainly paying for the non-food bills in these parts.  Still, a Margherita at Noi Quattro will set you back a mere £7, which is bargain in the relative market.

The wine pricing felt a tad heavy in places, especially as the wine list was super-limited in size.  Red wise, you went from the house, to a Barbera at £22, to a Montepulciano at £27, ending on a Chianti at £36 and that’s your lot.  Not bad for a casual quick eats place, and whilst the wine list felt similarly informal, so should prices.

And although the essentially untopped classic Margherita is a mere £7, it’s £13 so a further 6 notes for the 'Noi Quattro', which comes with cherry tomatoes, Parma ham, rocket, and Parm shavings. Is that an extra £6 of garnish, so almost double the price?  Not for me it's not.

Italian charm and warmth greets you as soon as you enter, and you're well-tended to throughout.  It's brilliant to see passionate people delivering a service which they are proud of, along with them delivering a product which you can see their love of.  We even got a 'Ciao, grazie' from the pizzaiolo as we were leaving.

Nothing to speak of on this occasion.  The simple, casual, functional service was right on brief.

We went with the staple pizza in a Margherita.  It's the benchmark; the original along with the Marinara, and is pizza at its most pure.  You should always use the Margherita as a barometer of how accomplished any pizzeria is.  Dough, sauce, Mozzarella, basil, olive oil, all properly balanced and teaming up well.  That's it.  There's nowhere to hide via toppings, so you get right to the heart of things.  Noi Quattro's was superb, and wouldn’t have felt out of place being served in any of Napoli's oldest Pizzerias.

We also went for a daily special pizza which was topped with squash puree instead of tomatoes, spicy Nduja, ripe Gorgonzola, rocket and pine nuts. Hardly traditional, but still delicious and the flavours were carried well by that same textbook crust.

House wine was a mixed bag in quality, at £20 for a litre which works out at a cheerful £13.50 for a 750ml bottle. We couldn’t decide on colour, so opted for half a litre of each. The red was drinkable yet unremarkable, but then it's a house red and we chose to order it.

The house white which we opted for as to avoid paying over the odds for a non-descript bottle, as the menu stated no yards or vintages, was a proper old school house white.  Overly acidic, white, and well, alcoholic, which is all most people who drink house will care about anyway.

But then the cheapest proper bottle is £22, so a fair jump from the house per ml, especially when you're paying £7 for a main course. Value wise, the house wine made price-balanced sense.  Briefly. 

Watch those price bumps for some of the pizza toppings and there should be more detail about the bottles on the wine list, especially for the prices charged. 

Noi Quattro are without question towards the top of the Manchester pizza list. Delivering simple, traditionally made pizzas, with scratch made, slow proved dough, with quality toppings, cooked in a proper fired oven, which all stacks up to delivering that Neapolitan trademarked soft-doughed, open-textured, slightly charred crust.  There's a score of different styles of pizza, but these are in short, the best style of pizza on the planet.  I love a dirty Pizza Hut or a stodgy, crispy, Detroit style pizza on occasion, but it's not proper pizza. Not really.  This, is pizza!