28/12/2023
For years, local pizza lovers have made the pilgrimage down to McLaren Vale’s Pizzateca for their famous “Oztalian” pies. So when the same team launched One Sneaky Cheetah in Ridleyton two years ago, the store quickly gained a loyal following. Now the drive for Adelaide’s best pizza has got even shorter thanks to a giant new venue on Magill Road.
Launching in early December, the Stepney site is the third One Sneaky Cheetah venue and General Manager Mark McInerney describes it as “fast, fresh casual dining; we want it to have a relaxed vibe but we still take the food seriously.” Unsurprisingly, the result is a far cry from your average suburban pizzeria with the kitchen’s attention to detail a major point of difference.
“A lot of places that have their own inhouse sauce might just get a tin of tomatoes and put some oregano in it. But we never used tinned tomatoes because our sauce is made from scratch,” explains McInerney. “We get the Roma tomatoes in, wash them, boil them, crush them and make the sauce ourselves. We also pit all our olives and peel the garlic ourselves and that makes a real difference.”
Add in hand-stretched dough that rests for 48 hours before cooking and imported ovens that char each Napoletana style pizza with trademark “cheetah spots” and you have one mean pie. And unlike the more traditional toppings at its parent venue, One Sneaky Cheetah is unafraid to expand the offering.
You’ll always find favourites like ham and pineapple and salami (with house cured salami and homemade chilli honey) on the menu, but the Stepney store will also become a testing space for new creations. In the week before Christmas, they launched their first ever seafood pizza topped with Ocean Catch prawns, and there will be a new flavour every month.
The sprawling former printing workshop also has room for a 60-person function space (called The Cheetah Den), while the cavernous main area is also spacious. That extra space has allowed the team to focus on in-venue dining rather than delivery, though customers will still be able to pick up takeaway pizzas in person. You’ll also find a bar with an expanded range of beverages including a dozen mostly South Australian wines and five taps pouring Sneaky Cheetah lager and pale ale alongside some very local offerings.
McInerney has already dedicated a tap to the alcoholic ginger beer from Little Bang’s brewery around the corner, and is keen to foster more connections with his new neighbours. “The other two sites sponsor local sports teams and we really want to be involved in the community here as well,” he says. “We’ve formed some good relationships while getting the venue ready over the last six months and it’s great timing that East End Cellars has just opened up across the road - there’s a lot happening in the area at the moment and we’re really excited to be a part of that.”
