If you’ve been looking for the best pizza in Newcastle, Sanco is the answer – and it does things entirely on its own terms. There’s no menu. There’s a light on your table. Turn it on, and hand-crafted Neapolitan pizza slices start arriving. You have no idea what’s coming next. You just keep eating until you switch it off.
It sounds like a gimmick. It absolutely isn’t. The concept is rooted in the Italian tradition of communal dining and, more practically, in reducing food waste — Sanco’s pizzaiolos craft whatever’s freshest, in whatever combination inspires them that day. Some visits you’ll get classics. Others, something you’d never have ordered from a menu but can’t stop thinking about. That’s the point.
The pizza itself is the real deal. Sanco’s team train with AVPN — the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana in Naples, the body that has protected authentic Neapolitan pizza-making since 1984 and holds UNESCO World Heritage recognition. The dough is made fresh daily on-site using Caputo flour, and the tomatoes are San Marzano DOP, imported from Naples. It all comes together in a Gozney Napoli Elite wood-fired oven – the kind of kit that serious pizza people get excited about.
The venue itself sits at The Forge on Forth Banks, a short walk from Newcastle Central Station and the Quayside. It’s an industrial-cool space that fits the concept well – unfussy, confident, focused entirely on what’s coming out of that oven.
Pricing is straightforward: £23 per adult for unlimited pizza, or £16 Monday to Thursday between noon and 4:30pm, which is genuinely one of the best-value lunch deals in Newcastle city centre. Kids under 11 eat for £11.50 including a soft drink.
If you’re after an honest answer to “where’s the best pizza in Newcastle?” – turn the light on.
HLN Top Tips
- The Monday–Thursday lunch deal (£16 for bottomless pizza, noon–4:30pm) is exceptional value - one of the best lunch deals in the city.
- Coffee and cannoli are served from 10am if you want to visit outside pizza hours.
- Parking is directly opposite in the Stephenson Quarter multi-storey.
- Nonna Franchi's tiramisu is worth leaving room for.
