Terra Mia

Terra Mia is a Neapolitan pizzeria in the north of Palma, on Carrer del 31 de Desembre, a few streets beyond the Avingudes. The house calls itself a pizzería napolitana and means the whole school by it: Italian flour, a long fermentation, a base with a high, airy rim. Walk up from the old town and you notice quickly that you have left the visitors' part of the city. Bons Aires is a residential quarter, and its restaurants live off neighbours. The card is longer than you would expect of a pizzeria. It opens with the entrantes, passes through a small pasta section into two rows of pizza — a classic one and a gourmet one — and ends at a dessert list with ideas of its own. In between sit the calzoni, one of them served open. What Terra Mia puts on the card The opening is Neapolitan: the crocché, a large fried croquette of potato, mozzarella, cooked ham and mild salami. Beside it stand a plain focaccia with garlic and oregano, a caprese, a plate of Italian charcuterie and a second focaccia topped with tomato sauce, parmesan flakes, burrata and Parma ham, meant for sharing. Among the pastas you find gnocchi alla sorrentina and two lasagne — one with ragù, one vegetarian with courgette, carrot, celery, asparagus, onion, aubergine and peas. The classic row of pizzas keeps to the repertoire: margherita, bufala, a napoletana with garlic, oregano, Cantabrian anchovies and capers, then capricciosa, quattro stagioni and diavola. One pizza layers five cheeses — mozzarella, ricotta, parmesan, gorgonzola and pecorino, the last of these twice over, as a cream and as cheese. And then there is La Golosa, which breaks ranks entirely: mozzarella, chips, frankfurter and house pink sauce. It is the proof that this kitchen does not take itself too seriously. The gourmet row and the Mallorcan streak The second row of pizzas is the more interesting one. Here the kitchen works with yellow Piennolo tomatoes from Vesuvius, with pistachio cream and mortadella, with walnut cream, gorgonzola and salciccia, with truffle, and with a carbonara built on egg yolk, bacon, pepper and pecorino. Provola e pepe gets by on smoked cheese and fresh pepper, La Vesuvio on yellow tomato sauce, buffalo mozzarella and pecorino. One pizza stands out because Naples would never have made it: sobrasada, goat cheese and honey over tomato and mozzarella. The Mallorcan spreadable sausage on a Neapolitan base is the point at which the house admits which island it stands on. The pizza crocché is just as unbothered, putting the fried croquette from the starters straight back onto the dough. Sweets, coffee and cocktails The dessert list is not a duty exercise. Alongside tiramisù, a Sicilian cannolo and a babà sit two house-made donuts, a cheesecake with strawberry jam and two sweet pizzas — one with Nutella and coconut, one with pistachio. Add a proper coffee list with cappuccino, latte macchiato and affogato, and a cocktail list running to negroni, espresso martini and several spritz variants. If you want to read up beforehand, the card and the allergen list are both on the venue's own site. Booking runs through the house's own reservation system or by message, and anything on the card can be packed up to take away. The Bons Aires quarter Bons Aires belongs to Palma's first ring of urban expansion and is still more a place to live than a place to go out. Its three axes are Carrer del 31 de Desembre, Blanquerna and General Riera; since Blanquerna was taken away from the cars it has become the quarter's strolling street, with shops, benches and terraces. Terra Mia has a terrace of its own on the street. To the north-west the quarter runs into the Parc de sa Riera, to the south it meets the Avingudes and with them the old town.