Gino Sorbillo, Tokyo's Most Legit Pizza

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I am a human being, and therefore I love pizza in all its forms. I even love Lean Cuisine and Stouffer’s French Bread Pizza. Some might say I love pizza too much. I said that after my 31st birthday when I ate an entire large Pizza Hut Pepperoni Lover’s pizza while lying in bed and woke up in the middle of the night vomiting in my own mouth because my body was like, “Dude, chill.” I swear the diet started like only a few weeks after that.

As a pizza-loving American, I’ve found Japanese pizza to be pretty disapointing. There’s cheap places like Saizeriya which aren’t of good quality but satisfy the basic pizza need. And then there’s Pizza Hut and Domino’s, which are not only way more expensive than in America (you’ll likely be spending at least $30 to have one pizza delivered), but they produce horrific abominations that make me question the sanity of this society.

Even decent places do stuff like putting corn, canned tuna, Tabasco, or French fries on pizza. If you don’t live in a big city, your chances of finding good pizza in Japan are pretty much nil. We had a good place in Kobe, but it closed so fast we could only go there once.

My love of pizza was rendered moot a few years ago when we ordered Domino’s on, of course, my birthday. The next day, I was so sick and… poopy (medical term) that I realized I must have become lactose intolerant in my old age. No more big blocks of cheese for Gregg.

But then we went on a big Europe trip in 2022 and found ourselves in Italy. I couldn’t NOT try the pizza in Napoli, right? I tried it, and it was delicious. Best of all, I didn’t get sick! I kept eating cheese the whole trip, even going to a cheese tasting in France, and I was totally fine. I ate pizza twice in New York with no problems. Maybe I would be okay.

Then we moved to Tokyo, and found a nice Italian place not far from our house that served a reasonable facsimile of Neapolitan pizza. We went there and ate it. It was good. 20 minutes later, about 3 seconds after we got home, I was overcome with such… poopiness (medical term) that I realized the intolerance hadn’t gone away. I guess I’m just allergic to gross Japanese cheese, but the good European kind is fine. I resigned myself to being a person who says things like “I only eat pizza in Italy, fum fum fum fum fum.”

But you can’t keep me down. I went to Eataly, the upscale Italian chain with locations in Tokyo, and had no problems. I also had a margherita at another local place with no issues. Could it be that Tokyo actually contains cheese of high enough quality that I can eat it?

I generally don’t test this concept, opting for a pizza marinara at Eataly, but I’ve longed to recreate the experience of eating pizza in Napoli, where the prosciutto flows like wine and the wine flows like beer. While planning a new trip to Italy that we’ll hopefully take, I looked up the best pizza places in Naples, and found that one of them has an outpost in Tokyo. We had to go.

Gino Sorbillo Artista Pizza Napoletana in Mitsukoshimae

Mitsukoshimae is a station not far from Tokyo Station, which isn’t too close to our house, but we found ourselves on that side of town. Just up exit A8 is COREDO Muromachi, a big shopping complex. You can’t miss it. Gino Sorbillo Pizza is on the exterior, so you can’t miss that either. Be warned: there is another COREDO not far away in Nihombashi; don’t go to that one.

The Sorbillo is BIG. There was no trouble getting a table. We were ushered right in, and there were plenty of empty spots on a weekday at lunchtime. The people seating and waiting on us were Japanese or… some sort of white… look, I wasn’t paying so much attention to them, but they weren’t Italian. I don’t know who was working the pizza oven or what kind of pedigree they had. It’s always tough with chains or outposts of faraway restaurants. Some, like Eataly, are quality no matter where you go. Others, like Denny’s, are a bit weird. The big question here was: would this be authentic pizza like in Napoli, or would it have corn on it?

The Gino Sorbillo menu and drinks

The menu is in three languages: Japanese on one side, Italian and English on the other. You probably speak one of those languages well enough to order a dang pizza. There were plenty of pizza choices, and all seemed pretty normal. There were also two pizza fritta options - that means fried pizza, a delicacy in Napoli.

I prefer italian-style pizza where you each get your own. I’m gonna eat an entire pizza no matter the size, so at least it’ll be light enough for me to take down the whole thing myself without getting sick. I went with the marinara, while Eriko got the pizza fritta with salami, ricotta, and provolone. They were nice enough to bring them out one at a time so we could share, and did so without our asking.

One thing you might not know about Italy is that they have amazing juices. Nearly every restaurant or cafe has a machine that makes fresh-squeezed orange juice, and they have these bottled juices everywhere too. Tokyo’s Sorbillo had a few options, one of which was blood orange juice. We each got one, and… wow. That is a strong-tasting juice. I could tell by the dark red color that they weren’t screwing around, and I was right. This is a sour juice. You won’t need a refill of this stuff. But that’s not why you’re here. You want the pizza.

Pizza marinara at Gino Sorbillo Tokyo

The pizza marinara definitely passed the eye test. As soon as it was plunked down, I was ready to dig in. It helped that I’d gotten a physical that morning, so I hadn’t eaten since the previous evening. While Italian pizza is usually served uncut, here it was sort of partially-cut so that it was obvious where to sever the crust to easily pull off slices.

The crust underneath the tomato sauce was impossibly thin, a mark of Neapolitan pizza, and part of why it manages to be less filling than its carb-heavy American cousin. The tomato sauce hit us both in the mouth right away: sweet, bright, strong, this sauce can be a meal all by itself.

The basil and oregano were tasty but thrown on there a bit haphazardly so that some slices had way more than others. That and the fact that the crust was a bit unevenly charred would be my only complaints. This thing was delicious. I never thought I’d be a no-cheese-on-pizza guy, but now that I kind of have to be, I love it. The pizza was delicious and not terribly unhealthy. Maybe the best pizza I’ve had in Japan? And we weren’t even done!

Pizza fritta from Gino Sorbillo Mitsukoshimae

Pizza fritta is something you know about if you’ve ever watched YouTube videos about what to eat in Napoli. It looks like a calzone, but it’s not: the crust is thinner and puffier, and there’s less crimping and breadiness. The thing that wowed us about this one, apart from how big it happened to be, was that it wasn’t oily or crunchy. They managed to fry it just enough to cook it without creating a giant mozerella stick. It still tasted light and reasonably healthy compared to what it might have been. In fact, the best part were the empty corners where the sauce seeped down and you just got crust and sauce together.

The cheese tasted good, but wasn’t incredibly flavorful - definitely not as good as the cheese I’ve had in Italy. If you’re American, you’ve likely had tastier ricotta than this. The provolone was all right, and I found myself continuing to eat long after I was full. I ate most of Eriko’s last slice but didn’t finish it because I’m trying to be an adult here. Oh, and before you ask, there was no trouble later from the cheese, so we’re good (by “trouble” I mean an avalanche of poop [medical term]).

I’d say the weakest part of this one was the salami. I’d assumed that a pizzeria connected to an Italian landmark would be able to source decent cured meat, but I was wrong. Instead of real salami, this was like charred strips of cut-up bacon, and not good bacon at that.

As Eriko said, “This one is good but marinara is the best.”

The verdict: is the pizza at Gino Sorbillo Artista Pizza Napoletana as good as the Italian kind?

After eating a whole lot of pizza, I needed some help digesting, so we sat for a while and I tried a macchiato. I’m a coffee snob, which means my opinions are strong and also correct. I find most espresso drinks at restaurants to be flavorless, so I didn’t have high expectations. But man, this thing was good. Stong flavor, well made, and best of all, the server didn’t feel the need to show me the tiny cup to make sure I understood how small a macchiato is (which is what they do at most coffee places, because I guess I look like I’m too stupid to know what drink I want).

Eriko and I agreed that the pizza fritta was a fun experience, but not something we would feel the need to get the next time we ate here. The marinara was the champion, for sure. We saw someone eating a margherita on the way out and were intrigued, so maybe if we come here in the future we’ll try that one. The question, though, is not whether the pizza is good - it is- but whether it’s worth traveling across town for, or making time in your vacation schedule to check out. That’s a bit of a tougher question.

Is this one of the best pizzas you’re likely to find in Japan? Yes. Was it the best pizza I’ve ever had? No. Several pizzas I had in Italy were better. I think it was better than Eataly, but not THAT much better. Eataly is 8 minutes on the train, this place 20. Is it worth the extra distance? Next time I want pizza, will I go to Sorbillo, or settle for the second-tier place by my house that isn’t amazing but still pretty good?

Pizza is a food of convenience. That’s why we value it as a delivery option. You get it when you want it now, with no fuss. You stick with the flavors you know you like. And while this place is good, and a convenient place to get lunch if you’re nearby, it’s not a fancy dinner out and probably not worth going all the way across town for. If you’re traveling through Tokyo Station, you could get a pizza marinara at Eataly that’s an 8/10 instead of dragging your bags half a mile to this one which is a 9/10. But if you’re in the neighborhood, you’d be a fool not to try Gino Sorbillo for lunch. Luckily, one of the many doctors I see for my many weird health problems happens to be only two train stops away (on two different train lines, but whatever I like pizza).

For Tokyoites, Tokyoysters, Tokydokies, we definitely recommend trying Gino Sorbillo. For visitors, stick to eating Japanese food while you’re here and save up for a trip to Napoli where you can get the honey from the source. In fact, stay tuned in a couple months, as we may just get to visit the REAL Gino Sorbillo in Italy!

Where is Gino Sorbillo Artista Pizza Napoletana in Tokyo?

Address: 〒103-0022 Tokyo, Chuo City, Nihonbashimuromachi, 3 Chome−2−1 コレド室町テラス 1F

Phone: +81 03 6910 3553

Website: COREDO Mitsui Shopping Park - Gino Sorbillo Artista Pizza Napoletana

Hours: 11 a.m. - 11 p.m.

Gino Sorbillo is located right next to Mitsukoshimae station, which is on the Ginza and Hanzomon lines. Go out exit A8 to find COREDO, and you’ll see the pizzeria ahead of you as soon as you exit the sation. MAKE SURE YOU ENTER THE CORRECT COREDO INTO GOOGLE MAPS because there’s more than one and you don’t want to go to the wrong place. Enjoy your pizza.