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There are pizza places you try once, enjoy and forget. And then there are pizza places that feel like someone’s life’s work – every blistered crust, every sour edge, every smart decision layered into the dough.
Head to Nimman Soi 5 and you’ll find exactly that at Garden Grove. Push open the doors and it hits you instantly: the charred aroma of sourdough bases ballooning in the Neapolitan oven, the buzz of ska bouncing off bright yellow walls, smiling staff ready to guide you through unusual toppings and the owner, Stefanos Karapatis, in the middle of it all – a man both calm and kinetic in equal measure.
This is one serious pizza operation – and the city’s first officially Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana-approved pizzeria. At its heart sits a sourdough culture born from Neapolitan fruit yeasts, dehydrated into powder and transported into Thailand after more than a decade of cultivation through Europe, Brighton food trucks and the UK’s biggest festival fields.
The dough is alive. So are the decisions
Talking to Stefanos over the open kitchen bar, one thing strikes me – he doesn’t really talk about pizza the way most pizza people talk about pizza. He’s not here to hype a crust, name-drop an oven brand or tell you he’s ‘bringing Naples to Chiang Mai’ like it’s a costume party.
When Stefanos talks, it’s full of passion – and he lets that reflect his work. ‘Chiang Mai rewards patience, and it will cripple you if you try to be too chaotic,’ he says as a pizza topped with sopressata, candied chillies and local smoked black puree pops in the oven. ‘That’s also how sourdough works – it’s a living system. With commercial yeast, the pizza chef controls the dough. With sourdough, you have to negotiate with it.’
Negotiate. That’s his word. And it makes sense. If you know sourdough (I’ve tried and failed) you know that you can’t brute-force consistency. You can’t rush it. You can’t tame it. At Garden Grove, the sourdough is the boss – the madre, if you like – and the restaurant’s most important living, breathing asset that, when proofed, formed and thrown into the oven makes for some damn good pizzas.
Carting ovens over oceans
Greek by heritage and raised across Europe, Stefanos didn’t start Garden Grove as a neat restaurant concept. In its infancy, it started as a DIY project that saw him carting sourdough across the continent, born from an unexpected obsession to make pizza differently.
Building an oven on wheels, he quickly grew with multiple mobile units and huge teams serving weddings, street parties and major festivals across the region.
‘It gave me a purpose during the chaos of the era,’ he explained. But the festival scene is brutal. Weather can wipe out months of planning, profits are gambled against new opportunities, and for Stefanos, that risk became too much for him and his sourdough.
So he came to Chiang Mai on a break, felt the pace of the city and made the dangerous call to rebuild Garden Grove in a way that could last – not louder, not bigger, just more grounded. ‘I literally moved ovens across oceans,’ he says. ‘And Chiang Mai has the same culture as sourdough – calm, cultured and rewards patience.’
The pizza rules the house
As a big pizza fan, I’ve nothing but good things to say about Garden Grove. Although their pizzas aren’t for everyone – and Stefanos is fine with that. Hot from the oven, pizzas arrive whole and unsliced – a Neapolitan tradition. Use scissors to cut your way through, and expect the slice to flop when you lift it.
‘We’re not trying to please everyone,’ he says. ‘We’re trying to be honest to the craft.’
He puts it even more bluntly: if a place tries to please everyone all the time, it ends up meaning nothing to anyone. Garden Grove would rather be the place that doesn’t need explaining, and judging by the packed tables most evenings, plenty get it.
Tomatoes come from the foothills of Mount Vesuvius, mozzarella made with Neapolitan milk, flour milled in Naples. Even the sourdough starter has its own story.
There are also personal touches that make a surprising difference: oregano grown by his father back in Greece, sent over because nothing else tastes quite like it. Even potatoes, he jokes, have been part of the mission – with farmers in Chiang Mai trying to grow specific varieties from the Pelion mountains in Thai soil as we speak.
If you want to taste the dough in its purest form, go simple. The San Marzano tomato with fior di latte mozzarella and organic basilico is the benchmark – clean, balanced and possibly the best ‘margherita’ you’ll eat in Chiang Mai.
If you like things fiery, go for the spicy Calabrian ’nduja topped with Amatriciana sauce, guanciale, crispy garlic and rocket — rich, smoky, properly fiery and probably my favourite. Or for something more Italian-authentic, the Friarielli with fennel-laced salsiccia sausage and Pecorino Romano DOP is the menu’s deeply Neapolitan combination that leans bitter, salty and beautifully balanced.
This season’s specials
Take a glance at the menu and you’ll notice the numbers don’t quite behave. They jump, skip, disappear and then reappear. Well-loved specials earn a permanent spot, while others quietly retire. Think of it like a perfumer perfecting a fragrance: layering, adjusting, letting combinations settle until one hits that unmistakable harmony.
After a recent refurbish, Garden Grove is opened anew, bringing two specials that lean hard into Stefanos’ southern Italian culinary origins.
#30 hits the specials menu with a white-style pizza that pairs the best of Napoli with fresh Chiang Mai fruit. We’re talking fior di latte mozzarella, cave aged caciocavallo, 36-month parmigiano chips – made to glisten with a sweet-sour organic Chiang Mai fig glaze. As Stefanos would say, it’s pukka.
Alongside it, the ciauscolo and burrata side offers silky contrast. Pugliese burrata comes served over Ciauscolo IGP that has been gently softened into a velvety texture, finished with, you guessed it, Garden Grove sourdough breadcrumbs and organic Chiang Mai parsley oil.
Top off the meal with a cool cup of their take on an alcohol-free plum sour – the last harvest, as it’s better known at the bar. Adding a beautifully tart touch to your palate, Myanmar plum concentrate is shaken with egg white and vanilla extract for that hint of sweetness.
Come alone and that’s a meal right there, but come as a group and the exciting menu of antipasti, sharing boards, salads and fried dough traditions are calling – including deep-fried burrata wrapped in sourdough, black truffle-infused arancini and fritta cornetto, a crisp sourdough cone filled with 18-month parmesan fondue, organic rocket pesto and dried kalamata olive powder – a flavourful ode to Franco Pepe.
What’s more, all pizzas and dishes can be adapted to your dietary needs. Gluten-free bases, vegan mozzarella and halal soppressata are all available at no extra charge, so everyone gets in on the action. Finish with a Sicilian sweet, a crisp Peroni on tap or a glass from the tightly curated wine list spanning Puglia, Abruzzo, Veneto and Tuscany, and and you’re not just having dinner; you’re stepping into a little pocket of southern Italy, right here on Nimman Soi 5.
Garden Grove. 33 Nimmanhaemin, Soi 5, Suthep. 4pm-10pm. Expect to pay around B500-B1000 per head for a proper meal with drinks.