Civerinos Forrest Rd/Meadows.

Civerinos Forrest Rd/Meadows

Two dough clocks run behind this counter: 72 hours for the panuozzo2 and, on the group's own account, 96 for the New Haven pies.4

Why go

Michele Civiera sold his sneaker collection in 2014, bought an oven and took a lease on Hunter Square.3 Forrest Road came next, open since at least July 2017 when The Scotsman reviewed it, and he runs it as a slice bar at the top of the Meadows with four builds going at once. The New York pies come 14 or 20 inches, fold, and carry parmesan in the crust on everything that is not vegan. The New Haven apizza is 14 inches only, thin and charred, and the group calls it a love letter to Pepe's. The Detroit goes cheese first and sauce after. The panuozzo is a split loaf of the 72 hour dough put back through the oven, and it only runs from noon until three.2

A single slice off a 20 inch is a meal, which is why the room can turn a queue, and Gaby Soutar found out the hard way that the whole pie feeds four. She reviewed this address in July 2017 and gave it eight for the room and eight for the food.1

Prices tell a nine-year story on the same premises. Her signature Civerinos slice was GBP 5.50 and a whole 20 inch was GBP 20 in 2017. The same slice is GBP 6.50 and the same 20 inch is GBP 25.50 on the menu dated February 2026, with a margherita slice still at GBP 4.75.2

Order this / avoid

• Order: THE CIVERINOS, GBP 6.50 a slice and GBP 25.50 for the 20 inch. The build has changed since Soutar ate it in 2017, when she got creamy puffs of burrata cheese on top of a piquant 'marinara sugo', some robust pepperoni and knotty clods of fennelly Sicilian sausage.1 The February 2026 card says whipped ricotta.2
• Order: the NDUJA on the New Haven base if you want the charred, thin version, GBP 18 for the 14 inch with hot honey over it.
• Order: a panuozzo at lunch. The caprese is GBP 12, the schnitzel and the cotto GBP 13.
• Avoid: the PICKLED JALAPENO at GBP 18 unless you want the heat. Nduja, pickled jalapeno and pepperoni on one 14 inch is the hottest thing on the card.

What locals & experts say

• Gaby Soutar, The Scotsman (2017), reviewing this address, on the base itself: The crust was suitably thin, with a billowy and crisp sidewalk-coloured outer rim.1 She marked work down where she found it too, calling the vegan Meat is Murder slice Not their best work, but still very pleasant. Neither that slice nor the hot sausage one she disliked is on the February 2026 card.
• Chiara Wilkinson, Time Out (2026), put Civerinos seventh in a global pizza ranking and made the argument for the style: with its chewy crusts, coal-fired bases, sweet-but-tangy marinara sauce and carefully curated toppings, I'd argue this New Haven-style pizza joint is up there with some of the best slices you'll ever shove down your gob.5 The room she describes in the same paragraph is the Stockbridge branch, so read that ranking as one about the group's pizza. Her phrase about coal-fired bases is hers; the group's own page says only that the New Haven style was historically coal-baked, and no source establishes what fuel this oven burns.
• The nine-year gap is the honest headline on the criticism here. One scored review exists for 49 Forrest Road and it was published in 2017. Everything more recent is written about the brand or about another branch.

Good to know

• Hygiene: Food Hygiene Information Scheme Pass for these premises, inspected 9 October 2025, which is under ten months old and current.6
• Hours: 11.30am to 10.30pm Sunday to Thursday, to 11.30pm Friday and Saturday. The panuozzo runs noon to three only.2
• Booking: none taken at this site. Walk in.
• Price: GBP 4.75 for the cheapest slice and GBP 6.50 for the house one, GBP 12 to GBP 18 for a 14 inch, GBP 22 to GBP 26 for a 20 inch, and GBP 27.50 for the rectangular Detroit pie, which is priced as its own format. All read on 4 August 2026. Dips are GBP 1.50 each.
• Sites: six Civerinos premises trade in Edinburgh and one in Glasgow, and this page is the Forrest Road one, which the group runs as a Slice Bar. Hunter Square is the original and the more formal room. The other Edinburgh sites are Stockbridge, Leith, Portobello and Lost Shore out at Ratho; the Glasgow one is on Radnor Street in Finnieston. The Portobello site holds an Improvement Required hygiene rating from April 2026; this address does not, and the two must not be read across.
• The room: exposed brick and graffiti, casual table service, and a takeaway window if you want a slice to walk with.
• Getting there: the top of Forrest Road where it meets the Meadows and Bristo Place, in the Old Town.

Verdict

could-visit — A slice bar that does one thing well and cheaply, with more craft behind it than the format suggests: four American regional styles run side by side, two documented ferment schedules at 72 hours for the panuozzo and 96 for the New Haven pies, a Detroit build that lays cheese before sauce, and a stated homage to Frank Pepe's on the apizza. The value is the real argument, a GBP 4.75 margherita slice and a 20-inch at GBP 22 to GBP 26 that Soutar says could have served four. What keeps it off the detour is whose kitchen the good evidence describes. The world rank-7 placing is a Time Out editorial ranking of the BRAND written by its UK deputy editor, and the room she pictures in the same paragraph is Stockbridge, so it evidences the group's pizza and not this counter. The only in-room scored verdict on 49 Forrest Road is nine years old, and the menu it judged is gone. Nothing establishes the oven, the flour or who makes the dough here. Against the shipped Edinburgh rungs, that is the Black Ivy and PIGGS Bruntsfield band, not the Skua and Cafe St Honore band. It is close, and it is close on value alone: one current branch-specific critical line on this address would make the case for should-visit a real one.