Any introduction about pizza is going to be stupid. It’s pizza. You (yes you) don’t know anyone who hates pizza and if they say they do, they’re lying. Pizza is too loose a concept to elicit genuine hatred. It’s like hating fun. Yes, the pizza may virtually have to be naked with just a smattering of cheese and tomato sauce on top in order to get them to not complain about it – but when that that first bite of pizza hits their tongue, for just a few seconds they get to experience goodness in the universe. There’s even pizza for the lactose intolerant and vegan.“Best Frozen Pizza” is a subjective title, especially when only reviewing five varieties. Every state is going to have a few varieties of frozen pizzas that are only available there. While those may be better than any of the five we decided to review, the ones we chose were ones that we felt were commonly available to everyone. Over the course of 8 hours, Chris and Ian drastically increased their chances of coronary heart disease and tried all five, instructed to rate the pizza based on value, taste, ingredients, selection, and gross personal bias.
Totino’s – Supreme: $1.29 – Prep Time: 15 Minutes
Ian (4.5/5): It’s taken me a long time but I’ve finally reached the point where I appreciate Totino’s the pizza more than I do Totino’s the pizza roll. When I was a kid I think I was distracted by the science of pizza more than the flavor: “How could they cram all the same ingredients of PIZZA into this tiny package? It’s so easy to eat!” The commercial even shows slices of pizza rolling themselves into rolls. Totino’s pizza looks like a failure on every level. It’s ingredients are so small and pathetic they appear to have come out of an ‘ingredient shaker. You can’t tell a pepperoni from a pepper. The primary ingredients in the crust are big pockets of air. When it comes out of the oven it looks pretty unattractive too, like a burrito that has unrolled itself and just laying there in a big heap. But when I bite into it, I realize why scores aren’t cumulative. It tastes wonderful – like delicious chemically created nostalgia. Don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t taste like pizza, just like a Big Mac doesn’t taste like a real cheese burger, but it has it’s place in the pantheon of my reliable staple foods.
Chris (4/5): This was a college staple for me back in the day. I remember being able to buy 10 Totinos for less than 5 bucks. Sure they’re not glamorous, they don’t look particularly appetizing coming out of the oven, they don’t have that many toppings on them, and the selection of pizzas at the store is usually limited to single toppings with the occasional “VIP” pizza like the supreme or the three meat. Obviously times have changed. Not only has the price gone up, but so has my income, meaning that I don’t need to buy budget frozen pizzas anymore. However, much like the McDonald’s spicy chicken, even though I know it’s not the best, I still love the taste and it still holds a special place in my heart.
DiGiorno – Supreme: $5.99 – Prep Time: 25 minutes
Chris (3/5): I don’t care what the commercials would have you believe, you cannot make a frozen pizza taste like something from Pizza Hut or Dominos. That being said, DiGiorno is like the head of the class for frozen pizzas. They pack toppings on there, they have a nice variety or different pizzas to choose from, it looks like a real pizza when it comes out of the oven, and the crust, well the crust is delicious. In my opinion it’s the best tasting frozen pizza out there. However, the thing costs almost as much as a regular delivery pizza. So for me, even though they taste great, it’s not really worth my money to get one from the store unless it’s on sale. Also, they take 25 minutes to cook, which anywhere between 8 and 14 minutes longer than the rest of the group.
Ian (4/5): It’s not delivery it’s…actually it’s probably a little better than some delivery. Of the five we tried, DiGiorno had the most appeal for me. With big hearty ingredients and a thick crust, when DiGirono cooks up it fills your kitchen with a nice thick aroma. With each bite you get a pleasant mouthful of ingredients that actually taste distinct, and yet come together beautifully. The base has a doughy cake-like consistency and when you eat your way down to the crust it sort of reminds me of a breadstick you might get at chain Italian restaurant. A more useful comparison than delivery might be restaurant or pizzeria style pizza and, by that comparison, DiGiorno falls apart but it’s the closest of our bunch here. An extremely solid entry.
California Pizza Kitchen – Sicillian:$7 – Prep time: 11 minutes
Ian (3/5): I understand. I get it. When you eat at a real restaurant (I’m not talking about Chili’s or Macaroni Grill but an actual real restaurant) one thing you notice is that the emphasis is on quality not quantity. Order fried mozzarella and instead of an overflowing plate of once-frozen mozzarella sticks you get a single piece of mozzarella that has been lovingly battered and cooked with a sauce on the side that is hand prepared and not spooned from a jar. It’s when food starts to approach art. To separate themselves from the run of the mill Black-Eyed-Village-Garden type places, some chains are starting to employ that less is more philosophy when it comes to food, and in this case one of those chains has now started selling their food in the grocery store.And it’s true – with nice pieces of salami and a tasty pesto base, as well as a wafer thin crust that’s light on the after taste – CPK is distinct. I just fell like at 7 dollars for a pizza that may still leave you hungry when you’re done, I think this might be missing the point of frozen pizza.
Chris (2/5): This is like the kid who moves from a big city on the west coast out to the Midwest, and just doesn’t quite fit it. Sure their pizzas taste fine, though they’re a little light on toppings, and even though it’s a thin crust they still taste a little bready to me. They’re probably the healthiest of the ones you can buy, but they don’t make just a standard “supreme” pizza, or just a regular pepperoni. When I make a frozen pizza, I’m not looking for anything fancy, but that’s really all CPK has to offer. It’s like walking into a restaurant and ordering a coke, and having them tell you they only serve diet cherry antioxidant 7-up. There are times when I do what that, and like I said they taste fine, but if I want one of their pizzas I’ll go to an actual CPK. Especially considering they run about $7 from the store.
Red Baron – Supreme Deluxe: $4 – Prep Time: 20 minutes
Chris (4/5): Ah, Red Baron. When I think frozen pizza, this is what I think of. It’s not terribly impressive looking, but it’s not expensive. You get a good amount of toppings, there’s a nice variety of different pizzas available, they’re only $3 or $4, and to me, I think they’re the next best tasting of the group behind Digorno. They’re a little bready if you don’t cook them the extra minute or two to make the crust crispy. But when you leave them in the extra minute or two, it really makes a difference to me. With Red Baron, you pretty much know exactly what you’re going to get. And predictability is what I want out of my frozen pizzas.
Ian (4/5): Red Baron finds the frozen pizza sweet spot. At $4, it’s hard to find major fault with. The ingredients, while not overwhelming, are flavorful. The crust has a pleasant consistency (their new firebaked crust actually has a great garlic-oil flavor to it.) It’s not on the level of the DiGiriono but in my grocery store, Red Baron is more often on sale. They also make a personal pizza variety that I keep stocked in my freezer for lazy lunches. Red Baron is certainly not overwhelming, but according to my personal criteria for frozen pizza, it does the job just fine.
Tombstone – Supreme: $4 – Prep Time: 20 minutes
Ian (2/5): Perhaps it was the rot-gut that started to set in after 8 hours of eating pizza but I hated the Tombstone. While probably an adequate pizza it didn’t accomplish anything specifically better than any of the other pizza’s in our showdown. The ingredients were like the Red Baron’s but, both Chris and I noticed a kind of rank dirty socks after-taste from the pizza sauce. At least the after taste had a flavor however because first bite had only a slightly sugary taste and nothing else. The crust was crispy and utterly devoid of any taste whatsoever. It was like eating pizza on white bread toast. I wouldn’t even buy this if it were on sale. Move on.
Chris (2/5): If only the pizza was as badass as the movie. Sadly, Tombstone is just another run of the mill frozen pizza. They offer basically the same pizzas as Red Baron, though they’re slightly more expensive. They do pack the toppings on their pizzas, which is nice. But their sauce is definitely sweet, and I don’t like that. It’s kind of like back in the day when Pizza Hut switched to the new chunky sauce that was super sweet (which I believe went away after about 6 months). Overall, there’s just really no reason to choose Tombstone over any of the other pizzas because they don’t bring anything to the table that you either can’t get with a different pizza, or that’s cheaper than their competitors.
- Conclusions
The Consensus Winner: Red Baron
Sentimental Favorite: Totino’s
Warning: Eating this much pizza will make your butt a’spolde.
Nutritional Tallies (Whole Pizzas):
California Pizza Kitchen: 930 – Salt: 2430 – Fat: 39 grams
Red Baron: 1736 – Salt: 3725 – Fat: 91.2 g
DiGiorno: 2220 – Salt: 6000 – Fat: 96 grams of fat
Tombstone: 1500 – Salt: 3200 – Fat: 70 grams of fat
Totino: 720 – Salt: 1680 – Fat: 38 grams of fat
Total: 7106 – 17035 – 334.2
Final totals consumed by our intrepid reviewers – 1776.5 Calories – 4258.75 mg salt (177% PDV) – 83 grams of fat (129% PDV)
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