Poblacion Has a Hidden Pizzeria Serving Surprisingly Good Pizzas for P99

(SPOT.ph) Right smack in the center of a Poblacion street only halfway to gentrification stands Pizzetta, a 24-hour pizza place. Most of the decor, but for the freshly minted bright orange logo and matching walls, are all vestiges of the building’s past: dim parlor lighting, a giant pool table, a grand centerpiece bar, and an upside-down painting of a cat. But there's an even more anachronistic feature one simply can't ignore: pre-inflation prices for seriously delicious handmade pizza.

Yes, pizza under 100 pesos still exists in 2026, and you’ll be shocked at how good it is. Prices start at P79 and don’t stray too far. In fact, you can order the whole pizza menu— all 15 flavors—for under P2,000. Just when you thought pizza parties were a thing of the past, brothers and co-owners Allan and Arthur Harrow are serving a throwback we didn’t know we needed.

At just P79, their 8-inch classic Marinara featuring just tomato sauce, garlic sauce, and oregano is so simple it spotlights the real star of Pizzetta: the crust. From pictures alone, the leopard spots of this asymmetrical Neapolitan-style pizza crust already signals how good a bite it would be. And it tastes as good as it looks—from the crispy, chewy, yet pillowy edge to the base gorged with tasty, sweet-sour-savory tomato sauce that’s almost the texture of melty mozzarella.

The Marinara, of course, is just the beginning. With just a few pennies more, you can enjoy more classics at just P99 a pie. You can start with their Margherita (P99) for your basil-mozzarella fix. If you’re a cheese head, though, get either the 5 Cheese + Garlic (P99) with its extremely gooey cheese-loaded base or the Spinach Dip (P95) with its dollops of verde-swirled cream cheese. The healthy Vegetarian (P99), you’ll find is quite the sleeper hit, with its fresh-sliced local tomatoes and crisp bell peppers making for an extra-juicy, mouthwatering bite.

In the premium section of the menu, where pizza prices skyrocket to P129 (ha-ha), you’ll find more of the flavors you might be craving. The Pepperoni (P129) spends just enough time in the oven for the cured meat to remain markedly fragrant. Their Hawaiian (P129) will expectedly spark a debate—you either love it or you don’t.

There are flavors here you won’t find anywhere else. Their Chorizo (P129) is imbued with Spanish flavors, what with its smoky, funky chorizo bites and pimiento. But our favorite is for sure the Chicken Masala (P129). The combination of spiced chicken, garam masala sauce, and yogurt-garlic had us so wrapped around its spicy little fingers.

Now for Pizzetta's "priciest" pizzas on the menu: Meat Overload (P149) is your timeless carnivore treat for the basic b*tches out there. You might be familiar with Korean pizza, and likewise disappointed by the version of other brands, but we kid you not: Gangnam (P149), perhaps because it’s Pinoy-Korean fusion, is actually pretty good. The addition of beef tapa and teriyaki gives it a much-needed salty kick to complement the Korean-signature sweet corn.

Japanese influences are also present, best demonstrated by the Samurai (P149). The surimi, bonito flakes, teriyaki, and egg mayo are exactly like a scrumptious mouthful of Takoyaki sans the hassle of scalding your tongue. Finally, there’s the African Suya pizzas with their distinct earthy, nutty, spicy seasoning brought vibrantly to life with crunchy capsicum slices. Choose the Suya Chicken (P149) if you want a more spice-forward profile, while the Suya Beef (P159) has a meatier umami to it.

Like we said before, much as we're thrilled about the different flavors, the secret in these pizzas is not in the sauce and toppings but actually in the dough. Head Chef Roland Mendoza shares that pizza dough is fermented in specialized chillers for at least 12 hours before it’s shaped. According to Pizzetta’s Italian consultant, most commercial pizzas up the yeast to skip this step, and end up with greasier pies that leave you with an aftertaste of regret. 

This is what separates the good from the mediocre, the machine-made from the artisan. Head Chef Roland even boasts that the crust stays soft and delicious a day after baking.

“But you will notice that if you eat our pizza, you don't get bloated,” Allan proudly proclaims, having been a longtime sufferer of post-pizza bloatedness in pre-Pizzetta times. And after sampling Pizzetta's full pizza menu of 13 flavors, we agree. 

Pizzetta came to be purely by coincidence, and not some divine calling for serving authentic Italian cuisine. They just wanted to make a good pizza that was affordable. There are tons of good, globally competitive, bougie pizzas in the metro but they also come with bougie prices. 

When we found Pizzetta on 5-Star Eats on Grab, we, too, thought it was too good to be true. The photos looked like a once-in-a-while treat. The looked similar enough to the high-end options in the metro that have graced international rankings. But at our first Pizzetta bite, we knew immediately: the comment section did not lie. And by the time we hit the brick-and-mortar shop (cheaper to buy from, BTW), we ended up tasting everything.

It’s hard to imagine in this day and age of late-stage capitalism: handmade, slow-fermented pizza that you can eat multiple times a week and still not go broke. A pizza you can eat at midnight that doesn’t make you bloat. Yet here we are, dear readers. Dreams do come true.