SALVATORE CUOMO - Neapolitan vegan pizza + surprises

SALVATORE CUOMO is a big Italian restaurant chain in Japan. When a new restaurant was opened in the shopping mall ZAZA CITY two years ago, I became curious, reading about their traditional pizza-making technique from Naples.

For vegetarians, it isn't very difficult to find something to eat in Italian restaurants. They often have pizza margherita and quattro formaggi (four cheese), as well as spaghetti genovese and other pasta with vegetable sauce. Previously, when I had to eat out, I chose such vegetarian dishes at Italian restaurants because I could hardly find vegan options.

But today, I was going to have a substantial lunch with buffet + vegan pizza. SALVATORE CUOMO had two options: buffet, or buffet + pizza (whole). I intended to choose pizza marinara, which is usually a vegan pizza.

When I came to the restaurant, I found that they serve pizza marinara with whitebait (shirasu) for lunch. I asked them not to add whitebait and explained that I couldn’t eat any kind of animal ingredient. When I took some vegetables from the buffet and asked about dressing, one of the staff members gave me soy source with yuzu (a citrus fruit) flavor. How kind, I thought.

The pizza came soon. This was the first pizza marinara I tried in my life.

I thought it was quite ok with these vegetables and the whole pizza. So, I was very surprised when one of the chefs came to the table and asked me if I wanted some vegetable spaghetti. “Because you can’t eat much of the buffet” he said. I hesitated but answered finally “Yes.” When I was going to take another helping of vegetables, the kind staff member came to me with a dish in hand.

She explained that this spaghetti had mushroom, shimeji mushroom, lettuce, and tomato and was seasoned with salt and pepper. I was surprised again because it was much more than I expected. They made this just for me! The spaghetti was cooked to al dente and delicious. When I was busy eating it and the pizza, another surprise came.

Three kinds of beautiful salad: carottes râpées with dried figs, radish salad, and tomato salad with onions and olives. It was amazing! The staff member explained one by one what they contained. I was impressed by their creativity and sincerity. She said that they also tried to meet the needs of customers with allergies, for example.

In addition to these dishes, I took acerola juice and peach flavored herb tea. The buffet included many kinds of drinks, and there was a chocolate fountain with several kinds of desserts around it, including fruit cocktail.

I really enjoyed the lunch. All the dishes were very good but what struck me most was their professionalism to satisfy customers. I got full and was also filled with thankfulness to the staff of the restaurant.

*This resraurant no longer exists. At the same place, a new restaurant Italian Kitchen VANSAN was opened in June 2020.