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Tony’s: Bacon Cheeseburger | Pizza Reviews | Pizzafork

“It all started back in 1960 at a little pizzeria in Salina, Kansas,” according to Tonys.com. “And it should have stayed there,” says Pizzafork, “away from the grasp of The Schwann Food Company.”

Tony’s pizza announced last year that they would be attempting to reanimate the lifeless corpse of a pie that they had become. They stated that their relaunch was an enhancement to their promise, “...established half a century ago to place authentic pizzeria taste within everyone’s reach,” as if they believed themselves to be some form of benevolent pizza gods, here to free us, the simple proletariat, from the shackles of overpriced capitalist gastronomie.

What Tony’s(®) didn’t mention, and never seems to mention, is their ties with the Shwann Food Company, makers of Red Baron®, Bon Appétit™, Freschetta®, Big Daddy's®, and Villa Prima® pizzas. A veritable capitalist Illuminati and wannabe pizza monopoly. Evil (Even more evil considered the chosen realm: freezecore. When freezecore is done right, the genre can succeed [see Pizzafork’s review of Private Selections]. But even a huge success in freezecore isn’t a pass elsewhere.).

“Pizza is a lot like sex. When it's good, it's really good. When it's bad, it's still pretty good, except for the occasional aftertaste of oppression that it leaves in your mouth.”

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Pizza Hut: Hot Dog Stuffed Crust | Pizza Reviews | Pizzafork

Its not easy to craft something special in today’s fast-paced automated world. After tweaking its formula and re-evaluating its themes for over 10 years, Pizza Hut has outdone themselves. The 1958 Wichita-born company soars beyond what anyone thought possible with their latest release. They have effectively rendered cheese-stuffed crust childish and primitive, shallow and pedantic. Seems like the hard work paid off.

Pizza Hut has a history of delving into the grandiose, but often at the expense of depth and density. It’s often easier to fill minimalism with meaning than maximalism; the arts’ version of Boyle’s law. The debate about a little excellent vs a lot of ‘just OK’ is never far from a pizza lover’s mind. But when you have a lot of excellent, what do you have to argue? This time around, Pizza Hut filled an entire stadium with gas. And the density? You could cut it with a knife.

After so many attempts at fusion pizzas, we finally have one that not only arrives at flavor, but continues, adding new locales to its pilgrimage. It shows no sign of stopping. A wise, voyaging tasty vagrant; a flavor savior. When Aristotle said that “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts,” he may as well have been prophesying the coming of this pie, a symbolic unity of black and white, poor and rich, old and young. It will be a tough act to follow, even for Pizza Hut themselves.

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With the release of Montage of Heck, many are reopening the question of Kurt’s death. One thing is for sure- pizza didn’t do it.

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Private Selections: Pesto Mozzarella | Pizza Reviews | Pizzafork

Beauty is only skin deep, except when it isn’t. Ugliness is only skin deep, except when it isn’t. Can an oven at 375 degrees turn a frog into a prince? No. Except when it can.

The Private Selections brand, Kroger’s version of Target’s Archer Farms, has been dabbling in frozen goods for some time now, and Pesto & Mozzarella is a new experiment, and one with a worthy result (if you see where they’re coming from, that is).

Most will write off what I initially saw upon opening the box to laziness, or apathy. Unevenly placed mozzarella, clumps of machine-squirted pesto, a misshapen visage- but, delving into the intentions and minds of the creators, it’s clear what they were going for: a character arc with an interactive interface. From start to finish, the pizza evolves, and not in a trite or forced way, à la Anakin Skywalker: child-killer. Kroger took a risk that lets you be the kiss to the pizza’s frog, the Mickey to its Rocky, the wise old mentor to its hero (or, perhaps, something more sinister, if you felt the desire).

As I rearranged the toppings, I connected with the pizza. Each slice of cheese moved was a vertebrae snapped back into place. I placed the pizza into the oven and felt worried as I left the room. I wanted that pizza to never be alone again. But, ultimately, I left. And I ate the poor thing.

So don’t get me wrong, the pizza had its issues, like any experiment. My heart compels me to give a higher review, but my brain restrains me at 7.2. Kroger had all of the right intentions with this piece, but there is still room for improvement. When I bake a pizza that I love so much as to not eat, the concept will achieve Nirvana. Until then, it’s just The Melvins.

[pizza4urday]

[peteneems]

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News: New York Squirrel Folds its Pizza after Local Fashion

Photo Courtesy Bryan of Park Slope 

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News: KFC Hong Kong Introduces Pizza Chicken

KFC Hong Kong recently released this fusion menu item: fried chicken with mozzarella, Parmesan, and marinara sauce. “Napoli Crispy Pizza Chicken.”

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Sleigh Bells eating pizza in Manasquan, NJ. via SPIN magazine.

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7-11: Four-Cheese | Pizza Reviews | Pizzafork

It’s sometimes hard to believe that we live in a world where 7-11 is as commonplace and unexciting as any generic gas station convenience store, and yet, here we are. Like the generation born after any great and bloody revolution, the king who once excited so many of our forebearers is just another piece of the everyday scenery. To say that 7-11 was a synecdoche of the 80s as a whole is a vast understatement. The count of numbers might as well read: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 80, 11.

With pizza itself being considered by many to be the lifeblood of the 80s and early 90s, it is unsurprising that 7-11 would try to expand beyond its normal fares of rotating hot-dogs, microwave burritos, and legendary Slurpees. So why the backlash? Why the revolt when you mention to anyone that 7-11 now offers pizza? It’s a perfect fit for the chain, right? The perfect appeal to their nocturnal crowd of stoners, with skateboards in hand, ball caps on backwards, comic books in back pockets... a near-extinct demographic. And therein lies the problem.

The pizza isn’t terrible. It plays a bit like a missing link between generic frozen and Hot n’ Ready. The woman behind the counter told me that there was no pizza ready, but she could have one in 3 minutes (contrary to the 90 seconds advertised by the corporate website), and that’s all the time it took. Not gourmet by any means, but satiating in the very idea of its simplicity. Romantic- an ignorant farmer who knows naught but how to till the land. The food of simple (albeit modern), everyday folk.

The fault lies with 7-11 itself. The audacity of trying to pass off this release as a genuine fit with the chain, so many years after their prime. To use the cliche, a ‘hollow shadow’ of their former selves. When you forget what lies you’re being fed, the pizza works- not well, but it works. But when you remember (and remember you will) you might as well have ordered a huge box of slap in the face.