The Best Pizza Near Forentum, by the Record
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Rank 1. Forentum
Neapolitan Pizza
The dining room is a natural cave, which sets the tone before the food arrives. Forentum is a casual country-cooking restaurant in Lavello's historic center, with a terrace out front and Basilicata's pantry driving the menu, plus occasional seafood and, come evening, pizza in three distinct doughs. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand, and the crowd seems largely local, which in a town this size is its own endorsement.
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A pizza restaurant in the small Basilicata hill town of Rionero in Vulture, Glamour turns out long-fermented pies with a light, fragrant crust and toppings built around local Lucanian ingredients. The kitchen takes the pairing work seriously, and the room is modern and tidy without trying too hard. It placed on 50 Top Pizza Italy, which in southern Italy is a meaningful flag to plant. Good wine and beer list, attentive service.
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A pizza spot run by three friends out of an old palazzo in Basilicata, with natural materials and warm light keeping things grounded without the usual designer fuss. The dough is the point: long-fermented, light, dry-edged, and never heavy. Ingredients lean hard on Vulture-area producers, some tied directly to the partners' own farms. The wine list follows the same regional logic. It landed on 50 Top Pizza Italy, which tracks.
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Rank 4. Il Balcone
Contemporary Pizza
A floor-to-ceiling window frames the Lucanian Apennines while you eat, which is either the second-best thing about this contemporary pizza spot or the first, depending on the day. The dough gets a long, careful ferment, landing somewhere between airy and substantial. Toppings lean into Apulian ingredients without turning the menu into a folklore exhibit. The beverage list holds its own, and the service is polished without being stiff.
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A pizzeria in Potenza where the dough choices are genuinely the draw: the whole-grain multigrain arrives toasted and fragrant, while the tomato-water version produces a golden, lightly crisp crust that somehow still feels clean on the palate. The kitchen takes fermentation and hydration seriously without making you sit through a lecture about it. Fried starters are the right way to open, the service keeps everything moving, and the wine and beer list pairs sensibly with the rest.
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Rank 6. Casarsa – Pizzeria Lucana
Lucana Pizza
A dough built from type 0, wholemeal, and wheat germ flours gives the pizzas here a crispness and lightness that quietly sidesteps the pillowy Neapolitan orthodoxy everyone else seems to be chasing. This is a casual, neighbourhood pizzeria in Potenza with an informal, young energy and a menu rooted in Lucanian identity. The fried starters are worth the detour, and the craft beer selection leans local. Named among Italy's excellent pizzerias by 50 Top Pizza.
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Rank 7. Alterego Pizza Boutique
Contemporary Pizza
A pizza boutique in Andria where there's no menu to deliberate over, just a chef-driven tasting format that moves with the seasons. The doughs are long-fermented and light, and the toppings lean toward combinations you wouldn't have thought to order but wouldn't argue with afterward. Wine pairings are taken seriously here, which sets the room apart from your average slice situation. It ranked 85th on 50 Top Pizza Italy.
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A pizza spot on the waterfront promenade in Margherita di Savoia, recently renovated around a large open oven that you can watch from your table. After splitting the family operation into a separate restaurant and pizzeria, the team narrowed their focus here: soft doughs, regional Pugliese flours, buffalo mozzarella from the Gargano. The menu runs from traditional pies to contemporary takes and stuffed focaccias. The family wine shop is a short walk away if you want to keep the evening going.
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A pizzeria in central Foggia where the doughs run light and the toppings are paired with the kind of deliberateness that earns the name "taste researchers." The room is compact and modern, the service quick, and they serve lunch, which in a city where pizza is mostly a night-out affair is a useful thing to know. Exactly the sort of neighbourhood spot that locals treat as a given and visitors quietly feel smug about finding.
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Rank 10. Robertino Cupo
Contemporary Pizza
A contemporary pizza spot just off the Salerno-Reggio Calabria highway, Robertino Cupo makes the case that pizza is a form of regional identity. The dough is high-hydration with biga, the crust slightly pronounced, and the toppings lean into local tradition without letting them overwhelm the base. The fried menu and a potato-focused section celebrate the Alburni hills. A spacious, well-kept room with a new outdoor terrace that handles aperitifs and small events.
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Rank 11. Lievito 72
Contemporary Pizza
The dough rests for 72 hours before it sees the oven, which is where the name comes from and where the logic of this contemporary pizzeria begins. The result is a square-cut pizza with a thin, almost imperceptible crust that stays light even after a second slice. Stone-ground flours and sourdough, toppings added at the table, ingredients that are mostly Apulian. The room is spare and unfussy, the drinks list longer than you'd expect.
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Rank 12. Pizzeria Giovanni Grimaldi
Neapolitan Pizza
A Neapolitan pizza joint that transplanted itself, fully formed, to the center of a small Irpinian town. The dough is the classic southern style: bold, direct, with a restrained crust that stays out of its own way. Campanian ingredients run throughout, with a few Slow Food presidium products in the mix. The room is warm and unpretentious, with bits of Naples on the walls for anyone who needs the reminder of where the allegiances lie.
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A pizzeria in the small piazza of Sicignano degli Alburni that has quietly become the go-to spot for the province of Salerno. The dough is soft and well-leavened, and the menu runs from pizza by the slice to fried homemade dishes. Local crusco peppers show up on the house pizza, which is a good reason to skip the deliberating and just order it. Young staff, decent wine and beer, no fuss.
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Rank 14. Pizzeria Levante
Contemporary Pizza
The dough gets the obsessive treatment here: long-leavened, soft through the middle, and just crispy enough at the edge. This is a contemporary pizzeria in Altamura where the menu runs across red, white, yellow, and green pies, plus slices of what the team calls Contemporary 3.0 pizza. The beer list leans artisanal, the room is modern without feeling cold, and the service keeps up without hovering. A spot that takes the craft seriously without making you feel like you're attending a lecture.
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The stone interior is old but the menu reads decidedly modern, a mix of contemporary and gourmet pan pizzas built around semolina and burnt wheat doughs that go through a long, careful fermentation. This is a sit-down pizzeria near the Molfetta center with a terrace and proper table service, the kind of place where the wine and oil list gets as much attention as the beer. Toppings lean local and seasonal without making a fuss about it.
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A contemporary pizzeria on the edge of Molfetta where every pizza has a music-themed name and the dough has been fermenting for at least 48 hours before it gets anywhere near you. The chef's toppings lean creative, pulling in textures like crumbled cereal taralli for crunch, and a full kitchen menu rounds things out. The room is modern and informal, the service attentive, and the prices land honestly for what's on the plate.
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A pizza restaurant on one of San Giovanni Rotondo's main streets, with a comfortable terrace and a polished interior that suggests the kitchen takes itself seriously. The fritti arrive first, crispy and well-seasoned, a warm-up act that earns its place. Pizzas run both thin-crust and Neapolitan-style, the dough airy and properly blistered at the edges. It ranked among 50 Top Pizza Italy's top hundred, which in Puglia is saying something.