Imperial Kitchen – Imperial Special Pizza

Well, one of my friends suggested that instead of just going randomly to places and writing reviews, I bring a pattern into the process and so, hence here I am starting a series of reviews highlighting a particular food item… So, first up is the humble Pizza and hence this post marks the starting of the “Pizza Trail” posts… So, the idea is basically to visit the various places (while hopefully staying away from the chains) which serve Pizzas and try their signature Pizza options… Essentially hoping for this to be a journal of the best Pizzas in Trivandrum (for now)…

Now that I finally decided to start the Pizza Trail series, I was confused for quite a while on where to start… Thats when I saw a review in facebook about a Pizza from Imperial Kitchen restaurant even making the bold claim that its the best Pizza in Trivandrum… So, isn’t that a good option to start at?? Hence here I am at Imperial Kitchen hoping to do the same… I was a bit skeptical when I arrived because from previous experience many of their menu items especially those involving the Tandoor oven are usually only available for dinner and I was here for lunch 🙂 However the waiter informed me that Pizzas are available for lunch as well…

I guess being a multi-cuisine restaurant and not a Pizza specific place, the options of Pizzas in the menu are quite limited… However, among that list, I chose the Imperial Special Pizza… The waiter informed me that its a seafood pizza consisting of shrimp and squid as toppings and its their signature option… When I enquired about the size, he told me that I won’t need anything else to eat as its quite filling for a person… I chose to go ahead with it anyways and ofcourse if you are regular reader of my posts, you would know that soups tend to be a weakness of mine and so, had to have that and so went for my favourite soup from the restaurant – the Chilly Garlic Chicken Soup about which I have written before in my previous posts about the place…

The Soup, just like last time was enjoyable with a combination of the flavours of the Chillies and Garlic working along with the Chicken Stock, Carrots and Egg drop, with minimal usage of corn starch, making it one of my all time favourites soups to have… However, one thing I noticed this time is that they have reduced the quantity of Chicken pieces in it, which if you ask me is a good thing… I mean getting filled up in soup unable to enjoy the main course is not an ideal situation, rt? 🙂

After the soup, came what I came here for… The Imperial Special Pizza… It definitely took a bit of time as one would expect considering that its made fresh from their imported Italian Clay Oven (as mentioned)… The Pizzas are all Thin Crust, which is how traditionally Pizzas are made… The Imperial Special Pizza as per the menu, essentially is a Seafood pizza contains Garlic Prawns, Squid, Onions, Black Olives, Bell peppers and Mozzarella Cheese on top of their Chef’s signature sauce… It arrived on a plate, as shown in the pic below and was served with a choice of Olive Oil, Red Chilli Flakes and Dried Oregano as condiments…

As can be seen in the pics, it is quite loaded with Squid and Prawns… In both the squid and prawns, I could taste that they have been flavoured with garlic and olive oil and were cooked perfectly… Usually I don’t prefer Squid as it tends to feel rubbery… But here, I found the squid to be just right… The thin crust of the Pizza was cooked perfectly as well and as one could expect, a bit crispy as well with a slightly charred bottom, especially along the edge… The Cheese on top even though looks a bit too much, in reality the flavour was mild and hence didn’t interfere with the taste of the rest of the ingredients… The overall Pizza was seasoned so well that I didn’t have to use any of the given condiments… Its been a long time since I had a seafood pizza and hence this was a refreshing throwback 🙂

However, I felt one tiny little problem and thats with the sauce used… It tasted like Marinara sauce was used here and the problem I had is that it felt store bought as I could sense that ever familiar taste of the preservatives that we usually find in the store bought packed foods… I know some people tend to use canned tomatoes or at-least the juices found in the can of canned tomatoes when making Marinara sauce, which can lead to that taste being there, but I personally prefer fresh… Other than that, I really enjoyed this pizza and it is one which I can recommend to anyone who likes having Seafood…

So, thats it for today… Hopefully, I might end up trying their other Pizza options soon… However, based on this, I would definitely be inclined to say that Imperial Kitchen is serving some of the best Pizzas in Trivandrum, but its too early to say as I have to try other options in the city before making that judgement… So, hopefully soon… 🙂