The best pizza in the world
The best pizza in the world is not from Italy - though it is made not far from the Italian border, in the French Alpes Maritimes.
The best pizza in the world has the thinnest base you could possibly imagine, which is, just maybe, a result of the thin high-altitude air into which the dough was thrown.
The best pizza in the world is topped with cured ham from local pigs and goats cheese from the herd in the valley just a stone’s throw from your table... or salty anchovies brought from the seaside 90km away in Nice.
The best pizza in the world is 38cm across, but comes on a 32cm plate, spilling over the sides to emphasise the decadence of what you’re being served.
The best pizza in the world is enjoyed huddled in the warmth of the chalet-style dining room of Lou Ben Manja in Saint Etienne de Tinée, at the foot of the Col de la Bonette.
The best pizza in the world is served with a hot chocolate and an espresso, which you mix in the same mug with two sugars and drink quickly.
The best pizza in the world is the one that turns you from a freezing, blue-lipped ice lolly into a human being again, after a cold ascent and freezing descent of the highest road in Europe, on the last weekend in autumn before snowfall closes the pass for winter.
The best pizza in the world is not far from Café du Cycliste HQ, so every time we head to the high peaks of the Southern Alps we go back. The pizza's still great, definitely top 10, but not as good as that one time, post-ride, when it almost brought us back from the dead.
The only other contender for the best pizza in the world is from a tiny place in Gaiole in Chianti, where the kitchen is on one side of the street and the tiny, sun-dappled patio tables on the other. It's the one you had after the Eroica in 2008 when... But that's another story.
What's you're favourite post-ride food?
Read more about the perfect soul food for cycling in our the best of series.