Indian food on pizza. Specifically curry on pizza. It’s enough to send a good friend of mine into hysterics, telling me how he likes curry and he likes pizza and that the two should be kept as far apart as Americans and the rest of the world. Just like he did when Shababs popped-up at Poli. Just like he did when The Covered Wagon popped-up at Poli.

I ate with that same friend at Indian Brewery about 4 months ago; loaded naans of meats and sauces and salads, colloquially a nanza, origin up-for-debate, but a favourite of just about every curry house I know for staff food. Now, at the new Indian Brewery Taproom they do Indian pizza. Is it really that different to a loaded naan? Of course it’s not. It’s just very clever marketing.

Before I get to those pizzas there is a few things to cover off. That room. Wow, that room. The gall, the gumption, the audacity to turn what could have been another block of flats into a brewery at the back, taproom at the front; massive screen for the football, bench seating, table service, pool table, and mezzanine with dart board. To keep much of the original features and to keep the huge vaulted space warm on a miserable winters day is both impressive and expensive. It’s the best place to watch the football in Birmingham, helped by a selection of their excellent beers.

The pizza is very good and could be great. The dough is light, stretched thinly with a crust that’s wide and aerated. It works best with the mixed grill pizza because the ratios work; tomato masala sauce, red onion, tandoori chicken, seekh kebab, mozzarella that could easily be paneer if you closed your eyes. It’s delicious. Really very good. The curry ones need a little work. It’s all a bit sloppy at present. Maybe less of that butter sauce, maybe a fraction longer in the oven to get the base going so that it can be held instead of spooned. They’ll get it right because the flavours are there. The butter sauce is superb, as is the vibrant green chutney spiked with plenty of chilli.

There are snacks of cheesey masala fries that leans on a pokey West Combe cheddar and tandoori chicken hung malai style in plenty of cream cheese, heavily dusted in Parmesan and thankfully absent in the promised truffle. Look, I’m all for taking the boundaries and stretching them a little, but truffle on my tandoori chicken is a step too far. The bill is £60 including a few beers and the Villa won. It’s going to be incredibly successful regardless of what I write, though I’m planning on being there quite a lot to see how those pizzas find their feet. Curry on pizza in a taproom that serves great beer with a massive screen for the footy. Tell me what there is not to love about that.

8/10