In the Kitchen with Fresh Hot Pizza

We joined James and Róisín at The Fox pub to hear how a simple idea became one of East London’s favourite pizza destinations.

In the Kitchen With is an original series from Honest Toil exploring the chefs, kitchens and restaurants using our extra virgin olive oil every day. Through conversations, dishes and behind-the-scenes moments, the series captures the people shaping thoughtful, ingredient-led cooking and the role olive oil plays in restaurant kitchens across London.

Fresh Hot Pizza started, quite simply, because James Fox decided to stop waiting. After years working with pizza, he found himself on the sofa one evening, finally committing to an idea he'd been sitting on for years. He set up an Instagram account, picked a date for a first pop-up, and realised he needed a name. "I'd always overthought names before," he says. "Then I thought about those old-school pizza boxes that just say 'Fresh Hot Pizza'. It does what it says on the tin. It's not trying to be overly fancy, and I think that suits what we do."

The first pop-up took place in a bakery in East London. Nearly everyone who came through the door was someone James already knew. By the final pop-up, that had changed completely. "People we'd never met before started coming back, bringing their mates and asking when the next one was."

Around that time, Róisín Lenehan had become part of the operation too. What began as helping after work on a Friday quickly evolved into something much bigger. "I used to come straight from the office and help with the pop-ups," she says. "Then I was planning on taking a career break anyway, and gradually started helping more behind the scenes." Today, James spends his time developing recipes and working in the kitchen, while Róisín looks after much of what happens behind the scenes – allowing the business to grow without losing the personality that made people fall in love with it in the first place.

Running pop-ups was exciting, but exhausting – every service meant days of preparation, packing equipment into taxis, setting up temporary kitchens and cleaning everything down again afterwards. Eventually, the model became unsustainable. After months of searching for a permanent home, James happened to cycle past a pub a few hundred metres from where they lived that had sat empty for years. "I stopped and asked the painter who owned it. He gave me the landlord's number, and that evening he just said, 'Yeah, let's do it.'"

The kitchen itself was built entirely around how they wanted to work – every shelf, surface and piece of equipment planned in advance. "We mapped it all out in our living room before we built it." Their menu follows the same philosophy. Rather than endless options, there are just a handful of pizzas built around exceptional ingredients. "I think anywhere I like eating has a small menu," James explains. "Too much choice is overwhelming. We'd rather do six things and nail them."

From San Marzano tomatoes to nduja and Calabrian chilli, the menu reflects one simple rule: do six things, and do them exceptionally well.

That approach runs through the whole menu, and it's exactly what we documented during our afternoon in the kitchen. James prepared two of their signatures: the Red Pie, topped simply with San Marzano tomatoes, Grana and Coolea shavings, and the Dalston Hot, layered with San Marzano, nduja, Calabrian chilli, stracciatella and Grana. Both are finished with a generous drizzle of Honest Toil, bringing everything together with a peppery, vibrant finish that's become a staple in their kitchen.

There's no interest in overcomplicating things. The tomatoes are some of the best they can buy, the toppings are carefully considered, and the specials give room to experiment while the core menu stays reassuringly familiar. One of the most talked-about pizzas is the Spam Hawaiian. "People always look at it sideways," James laughs. "Then they order it."

What surprised us most wasn't just the pizza, but how naturally Fresh Hot Pizza fits inside a neighbourhood pub. It feels less like two businesses sharing a space and more like they were always meant to exist together. "Pub culture and pizza just work," James says. "People come for a few pints, order a few pizzas for the table, and share everything."

It's exactly the atmosphere they've built – relaxed, generous and without pretence. Like the name itself, Fresh Hot Pizza doesn't try to be anything it's not. It simply does what it does, exceptionally well.