Pizza Day

Pizza Hut Bucks the Fake Food Trend

by Bruce Watson, Posted Jan 17th 2009 @ 3:00PM

I tend to be pretty particular about my pizza. When I lived in Virginia, I plotted out most of my region based on the tastiest pizza, the best priced pizza, and a few other key pizza considerations. While New York is a daunting pizza town, I've spent much of the past few years figuring out the best pizza places, calibrating the difference between amazing pizza and that which is simply acceptable, and generally trying to figure out how to best enjoy one of my favorite foods.

While I prefer mom and pop pizza joints, I have occasionally been know to frequent chain pizzerias. Of the major pizza franchises, my favorite was always Pizza Hut; their flavors always struck me as particularly clean, and their ingredients always seemed quite fresh. However, when I removed high fructose corn syrup from my diet, I started being able to taste it in fast foods. One day, while eating a pizza, I detected its foul flavor in the sauce. A little research confirmed my suspicion: Pizza Hut was using the dreaded HFCS. In a moment, Pizza Hut joined the foully-sweet Papa John's and the blandly repulsive Domino's on my no-eat list. My "pizza island" got a little smaller, a little narrower, and a little sadder.

Recently, however, the chain has developed The Natural, a pizza that allegedly uses vine-ripened tomatoes and all-natural mozzarella, while eschewing artificial ingredients like HFCS, nitrates, nitrites, artificial colors, and preservatives. According to some sources, they are planning to extend this all-natural trend to the rest of their line.

It looks like I may have to revisit one of my old favorites!

Filed under: Trends, Pizza Day, Ingredients, Chefs & Restaurants, Fast Food, New Products, Restaurants

Tip of the Day: How to reheat leftover pizza

COMMENTS 1

by Bob Sassone, Posted May 19th 2008 @ 6:01AM

Do you have leftover pizza this morning? Don't reheat it in the microwave!

Filed under: Pizza Day, Tip of the Day, How To

DiGiorno Ultimate Focaccia Pizza

COMMENTS 9

by Bob Sassone, Posted May 1st 2008 @ 7:05PM

DiGiorno pizza This pizza is so new that DiGiorno doesn't even have any info about it at their web site, except a picture of the box.

This is the latest pizza in DiGirono's "Ultimate" line. They just keep releasing pizzas that are the ultimate this and the ultimate that. They should just go ahead and name a product This Is The Only Pizza You Ever Have To Buy, All The Others Suck. But I guess that would mean they couldn't release any new pizza products.

This is pretty good actually. It's incredibly thick and has a crunchy focaccia crust, and it's probably the heaviest pizza box I've ever carried out of the store. At first I thought it came with its own pizza stone or something. Right now it's in two flavors: cheese with sun-dried tomatoes and pepperoni with spicy red pepper flakes. I tried the former, and while the taste of toasted sun-dried tomatoes got to me after a while (definitely a topping you can't overcook), it was tasty and filling. Tonight I'm going to buy the pepperoni version (and kudos for someone finally releasing a pizza that has those red pepper flakes on top!)

Filed under: Stores & Shopping, Pizza Day, Ingredients, New Products

The price of a slice is going up

COMMENTS 4

by Marisa McClellan, Posted Feb 28th 2008 @ 9:59AM

screen grab from NBC10 of a pizza shop window

Pizza, that inexpensive, staple food of students and late night revelers, is about to get a little more expensive. Pizza shops and other businesses that use a lot of flour are feeling the pinch of rising prices and are starting to pass those costs along to the consumers. According to a report on Philadelphia's NBC10, in addition to being effected by rising fuel costs, flour prices are also going up as farmers plant corn in place of wheat in order to meet the demands of alternative fuel manufacturers.

Pizza will still remain relatively inexpensive, with slice prices going up in $.25 and $.50 increments. Whole pie might run you a buck or two more than they did in the past.

[via NBC10]

What impact will rising pizza prices have on your ordering habits?
No effect, I don't mind paying an extra quarter	91 (47.2%)
I might cut back, but when you want pizza, you want it	60 (31.1%)
I'm definitely reducing my calls to the local pizza joint, a buck a pie more is highway robbery	42 (21.8%)

Source

Filed under: Pizza Day, Ingredients, Chefs & Restaurants, Bakeries, Restaurants

Freschetta PizzAmore

COMMENTS 12

by Bob Sassone, Posted Feb 20th 2008 @ 7:02PM

I've been seeing these commercials for the new Freschetta PizzAmore. It comes pre-sliced and the ads promise that it tastes just like one that you'd get in a pizzeria.

Um, it doesn't.

Filed under: Raves & Reviews, Trends, Stores & Shopping, Pizza Day

Do you make the best pizza in the country?

COMMENTS 1

by Bob Sassone, Posted Feb 8th 2008 @ 12:12PM

Bolla Taste Of Your Town Everyone always says that the pizza they make at home is better than what they can get delivered on at the supermarket. Now's your chance to prove it.

Bolla Wine is having a "Taste of Your Town" Pizza Recipe Contest. They're looking for the best regional pizzas in the country. And not just any ingredients, either. They want recipes that use ingredients and toppings that are local to you. They also want you to tell them which Bolla wine would go with your pizza. Five first-place winners will get a handful of prizes, including a Delonghi Pizza Oven. The Grand Prize winner gets a trip to Europe and a tour of the Bolla winery.

Filed under: Pizza Day, Food Politics

Pizza tracking from Domino's

COMMENTS 1

by Shayna Glick, Posted Feb 1st 2008 @ 12:00PM

Here's a quick poll. How many of you are planning to order pizza on Sunday? Pizza is one of the most popular Super Bowl foods and pizza delivery places are known to get swamped on this particular day of the year. Don't you wish there was a way to keep track of your order? A way to take some of the anxiety out of waiting on your order to arrive.

If you ordered a Domino's pizza, there may soon be a way. The pizza chain is currently testing a phone tracking system in 3,200 of it's 8,500 U.S. stores. You would call the system, enter your phone number, and be informed of the whereabouts of your pizza to within 40 seconds.

There's one area of the order cycle that Domino's won't inform you about. Domino's did consider a GPS tracker for drivers. But for safety reasons, the tracking system won't tell you where the actual delivery person is en route to your location. You'll just have to be content knowing when your pie left the store. Even without knowing where the deliverer is, it's nice to be able to know where your pizza is the rest of the time.

[Via ColdMud]

Source

Filed under: Business, Pizza Day, Food Gadgets, Super Bowl XLII, Ingredients, Fast Food

Easy Grands pepperoni pizzas

COMMENTS 5

by Bob Sassone, Posted Jan 11th 2008 @ 3:21PM

Easy Grands! Pizza As a lover of all things pizza-related, I really have to try these.

It's a recipe for pepperoni pizza, only using Pillsbury's Easy Grands! refrigerated biscuits. I always get a little uneasy when I see an exclamation point in the middle of a sentence instead of at the end. Imagine! how! annoying! that! would! be! if! it! was! done! all! the! time!

Anyway, these look pretty good, and ridiculously easy to make. What I find particularly great is that the Grands! come in various flavors (original, buttermilk, Southern style, etc), so you can get some different tastes without adding anything extra to the recipe.

Filed under: Pop Food, Pizza Day, Ingredients

Happy National Cheese Pizza Day!

COMMENTS 4

by Bob Sassone, Posted Sep 5th 2007 @ 8:18AM

cheese pizza

Wow, talk about the ultimate holiday.

Of course, most people don't need a special holiday to celebrate their love of cheese pizza (if I could eat if for every single meal of my life...well, I wouldn't, that would be boring, but it's probably my favorite food). But this would be a good day to make a pie of your own. Hopefully today just happens to be your "cheat day" if you're on a diet.

Here's a bunch of cheese pizza recipes, from Jeff Varasano, MealsMatter, MyRecipes, RecipeZaar, Wolfgang Puck, Emeril, and Rachael Ray.

Of course, if you don't want to make your own and want to call Pizza Hut or Papa John's or maybe go the store and buy a frozen Mystic or Freschetta or even Ellio's, well, that's OK too! And don't forget the posts from our Pizza Day celebration.

Filed under: Trends, Pizza Day, Ingredients, Holidays

Mmmmm...random pizza

COMMENTS 1

by Bob Sassone, Posted Jun 11th 2007 @ 3:03PM

After pointing you to Wendy's new Design A Burger contest, I figured I'd point you to this site, since many of you eat pizza and not burgers.

It's the Random Pizza Generator, and it automatically chooses your crust, the types of cheese and all of your toppings for you. It's sort of like that idea Kramer had on Seinfeld, only you won't burn your fingers. The webmaster doesn't suggest you actually make the pizza you get, but if you do, take a picture of it and he'll post it.

The one I got was Smoked Gouda, Provolone, Cauliflowers, Salsa, Wurstel, and Spam. For the record, I am never making that.

Filed under: On the Blogs, Pizza Day