It’s 7.30pm on a Wednesday night. You’re poking around the fridge hoping to unearth something other than a wet bag of lettuce. Woe is you, it’s looking hopeless. Before you reach for the two minute noodles, an Oskar pizza may be just the thing for your hump day blues.
Oskar is a small pizza restaurant that sits unobtrusively on Errol Street. Yes it’s smart and classy with white tablecloths, a spiky chandelier and shiny, black walls, but young and cheerful staff keep the tone chilled enough for a mid-week meal. On a clear night, outside tables are prime real estate for the mainly thirties plus crowd enjoying a quiet glass of wine.
The menu consists of pizza, two salads and two desserts (gelato and a chocolate pizza). The pizzas are a roll call of classic contemporary combinations such as potato and rosemary, smoked salmon and ricotta and mushroom and tallegio cheese. Pulled from the blazing wood fired oven, the bases are thin, crisp, puffed up in parts and have that requisite chewiness. Toppings are just right – not so heavy you think you’re eating at Pizza Haven, and not so light you’re wishing you stayed home to eat toast and tomato sauce.
The quail pizza is one of the more unique choices. With shredded quail meat, crisp wavy pancetta, sprigs of oregano and blobs of rich, brown onion relish, it’s like a grown up version of a BBQ chicken pizza and a delicious celebration of salty and sweet. Next up is the pumpkin pizza, where thin slices of roasted pumpkin meet ricotta, pine nuts and rocket (not quite as perky as you’d hope). It’s a successful combination, but after the flavour-packed quail pizza, the softer, creamier flavours pale in comparison.
If you’ve ordered ambitiously, staff will happily box up any leftover pizza for takeaway. And if extracting yourself out of your tracksuit pants is all too much, you can always call up for take away!