Pizza Marumo
Inside the Ebisu pizzeria, where a 24-hour ferment and a custom wood-fired oven turn kombu and bonito into one of the world's best pizzas
Ebisu already has plenty of good food, but Pizza Marumo carved out a name distinct enough to land it among the world’s 10 best pizzerias in a Best Chef Awards ranking, less than a year after opening in December 2022. Chef Yuki Motokura spent three years at Savoy before going out on his own, picking up time in a kaiseki kitchen, an Italian restaurant, and a bar along the way. He ferments his dough for 24 hours and bakes it in a custom wood-fired oven built by a traditional kiln maker, landing somewhere between Neapolitan and Roman without quite committing to either. He calls it Tokyo-style. The menu backs him up: a classic Margherita sits next to a pizza built entirely around umami, the kind of dish that could only come out of a Japanese kitchen.
The back wall is stacked with neatly split firewood. Marble counters gleam under bright light, and the white-tiled kitchen feels immaculate. Waves of heat from the wood-fired oven warm your cheeks. At Marumo, a pizza arrives topped with pale green ribbons of kombu and finely sliced negi. Beneath, dried shiitake cream, mackerel, bonito flakes and mozzarella melt into a crust that’s soft and airy. From the counter, the chef checks each pie, offering a quiet word to a younger cook before the next goes in. One pie feels like enough until another emerges from the oven, blistered and fragrant. Nearby tables lean forward in anticipation. You step back into the night air still carrying the warmth with you.
Pizza Marumo
Address: 1-11-13 Ebisu Minami, Shibuya-ku
3-minute walk from Ebisu Station
Website: pizza-marumo.com
Instagram: @pizzamarumo
