There’s this amazing pizza place in Edinburgh called Pizza Pakwan that we went to three times in two weeks during our trip to Scotland in 2022.

It wasn’t just any pizza— this takeout-only restaurant place specializes in desi pizzas.

Their menus included classic South Asian toppings such as tandoori chicken, lamb seekh kebab, and chicken tikka. They even had a Punjabi chicken tikka masala pizza.

Yum.

When we came back to Ottawa, our first mission was to find a desi pizza spot that could satisfy our pizza cravings and whisk us back to Scotland through its spicy flavours at the same time as taking us to Ameya’s homeland of India.

Well, we found one.

Al Raheem South Asian Marketplace and Shinwari BBQ and Pizza not only sells groceries products from ghee to spices to fresh cuts of meat, they also sell some of the best pizza I’ve had in Ottawa with a desi twist.

The creamy melt and pesto chicken pizzas were melt-in-your-mouth delicious and weren’t too spicy for those who prefer a milder flavour. The behari bites and tandoori chaska pizzas each had nice kicks to them, without compromising the flavour of the other ingredients.

We highly recommend asking for an extra dipping sauce or two. Who can have pizza without dipping sauce? Let alone a dipping sauce that is as delicious as this one and that I haven’t had the likes of at any other pizza place in town.

Next time we visit, we will have to branch out into the flavors of their BBQ menu and, if it’s anything like the pizza, it will be heaven on a plate.