Who would have thought that when walking down the foodie-friendly Margaretenstraße, we would pick the place with the fat angry looking man showing off his beer belly and moobs (meaning: man boobs) on the sign outside?
Pizza Randale makes clear from the beginning that this won’t be your regular kind of pizzeria, and that’s ok, because Vienna needs variety like pizza needs cheese: badly.
This pizzeria’s double life also has something to do with how it’s… different. At a certain point in the evening, the pizza ovens are turned off and Randale morphs into the form of a funky bar. Pizzeria, bar – it works as both. It’s actually housed in what used to be the grungy bar, Transporter.
If you belong to those who go to the super-authentic pizza places in Vienna to practice the little Italian you picked up on your Riviera holiday last summer (prego, signore!) then note that Pizza Randale might not be the place where you’ll get to roll your R’s. Other than the classic Margherita, Diavola and Marinara pizza, few things will look familiar on the quirky menu. For Randale, you’ll have to let go of your pizza principles, quietly apologise to your potential Roman ancestors and let your tastebuds come out and play.
If you feel like letting out the Viennese in you, we suggest you try the Wiener Blut Pizza, starring the famous blood sausage known as Blunzn, balanced out with a sprinkle of apples and thyme. If you like to live on the wild side, go for the pizza Alba, which features fennel-infused boar sausage, walnuts and truffle oil. If mixing savoury with sweet is your thing (you weirdo!), we recommend trying the summer limited pizza featuring goat cheese, figs and honey.
We cannot help but notice a Bud Spencer theme that plays throughout the eatery (also, hard to miss because of the HUGE Bud Spencer poster present on one of the main walls inside). Now, for our our younger audience, Bud Spencer is a bad-ass Italian actor who peaked in the 60s and 70s, a big guy with iron fists and a great sense of humour. No wonder the guys at Randale dedicated one of their “manliest” pizzas to this legend: The Spencer Pizza, topped with Black Angus Roast Beef, yellow tomatoes and lemon infused oil.
Which ever creation you try, you won’t be disappointed here, because, leaving aside the quirkiness that you can’t see past, the pizza makers at Randale respect the pizza code like any restaurant that doesn’t want to be shamed by the Italian community: the ingredients are of a great quality, carefully sourced, while the dough is always made fresh and baked to a fluffy-crust, and thin middle perfection.
The guys at Randale add their original touch to pretty much everything on the menu (black tea-infused apricots with your caprese salad, anyone?), and the bar’s drinks list is an original as well. Not only are they one of the few bars catching onto the Mezcal madness worldwide (there’s a delightful Mexican tipple on the menu from Oaxaca), but they’ve also got a range of their own creations, including their own version of a G&T, a Mule and a potent Long Island.
Just go there with an open mind (and ideally with a reservation) and expect the menu might change often, as it seems like the same creative minds who made a big, fat, beer-bellied guy as their logo, can’t sit still when it comes to pizza creations either.
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