In this thread you will see more of frozen pizza reviews where I will dive in the exciting world of flash-frozen pizza and frozen pizza-related items like Hot Pockets, Pizza Pockets, Pizza Bagels and alike. Frozen pizza is convenient, often tasty and frequently can be bought on promotional sales. But the most important part about frozen pizza is the wide selection of products and flavors that are available for purchase in America supermarkets and convenience stores. To start-off this thread I will begin with the review and product "side-by-side" comperison of Freschetta and Red Baron pizza from their "By The Slice" selection.

Both, Red Barron and Freschetta brands are owned and manufactured by Schwan Food Company: a multi-billion [dollar] corporation that employs more than 17,000 workers and also owns and makes another brand of frozen pizza that I like which is called Tony's. Before this review-comparrison I was already familiar with Red Barron pizzas, but I never could get my hands on Freschetta because the local food stores do not carry it, so when I was in Stop & Shop last week, I bought a couple of them.

On the team Freschetta we have 2 kinds of slices: "Chicken, Spinach & Mushroom Pizza" and the "BBQ Recipe Chicken Pizza".

And on the Red Baron's squad we also have 2 different kinds of pizza slices: "Supreme Pizza" and the "Pepperoni Pizza".

Small note on the product specs: Freschetta products cost $2.49 and only 1 slices comes in a box while Red Baron products were 2 boxes for $6.00 and each box had 2 slices of pizza. All of the 4 pizza varieties come in a cardboard heating tray that is sealed with plastic wrap.

Since I was excited to try the Freschetta brand pizza first and did, I will start off with their lineup:







Chicken, Spinach & Mushroom Pizza was the first slice that I tried from these 4 pizza varities and I liked it: it was very well balanced pizza that I though was worth the money even when I am not a fan of spinach. One of the ingredients that made this pizza selection stand from the rest is that instead of tomato-based sauce there was the creamy white sauce. All ingredients, including this sauce gave me the impression of artisan/gourmet type of pizza with this Freschetta selection. In a way I could see myself eating this kind of pizza somewhere in rural Tuscany away from New York's standard pizza variety. A glass of red wine could compliement this selection of toppings, but I am not a wine guy so do not take my word for it. But on the other hand give this pizza and a bottle of some cheap red wine from Trader Joe's a tandem go and let me know if my idea of pizza and wine works.





BBQ Recipe Chicken Pizza was even more intriguing product [by looking at the box] than the previous pizza, and I saved it for the 2nd tasting. I was really excited by the use of BBQ "pizza sauce" instead of the regular tomato-based pizza sauce. This BBQ sauce was not your average BBQ, I think that the guys in the lab made sure to give it unique taste and viscosity that would compliment the other ingredients of the pizza, generally the sauce was tangy, sweet and very pleasant. Chicken pieces were aso very tasty (non-marinated but included genuine chicken flavor, in other words not bland) especially when combined with sweet red peppers and red onions. A blend of 2 cheeses (mozarella and cheddar) was also present in the ingredients. The thing/imgredients that killed this pizza selection for me was the use of cilantro: I hate cilantro, the way it smells and tastes. If you like cilantro then I bet that you would love this pizza selection, for me it would be great pizza if the cilantro was not present.





Moving on to Red Baron's Supreme Pizza now. I tried Red Baron Supreme pizza a bunch of times before in the form of whole pies (cut into the slices for consumption). With this pizza you get the folowing ingredients: mozarella cheese, sausage bits, pepperoni slice bits, red peppers, green peppers and sweet onion pieces. In my opinion this frozen pizza from Red Baron hits the spot just right. Out of all frozen pizzas, Red Baron Supreme pizza seems to always work for me and its my favorite pizza of all the frozen pizzas out there. Great value (in terms of toppings), excellent combination, generous quality of topping - simply great; 5-stars. I just don't know and never encountered a pizza that would win my preference over Red Baron Supreme Pizza. If you never tried it then I urge you to give it a shot.





The 4th and last pizza slice will be the Red Baron Pepperoni Pizza. While not rich in the quantity of toping ingredients, this slice surely packs a lot of flavor and taste. The pepperoni slices were genuinely-quality ones and the after the slice was cooked, the flavorful grease could easily be seen with a naked eye, which was a sign of quality. Another good thing about this pizza is the amount of cheese and pepperoni slices that were topped-on, with Red Baron you have fairly generous amount of topping on the pizzas that is always balanced well with the good-tasting pizza sauce and the addictively-crunchy crust. I honestly enjoyed this slice so much that I decided to make another one right after I was done with the 1st one.

Here is my rating from 1st to 4th from the pizza slices that I have tried:

1) Red Barron Supreme Pizza
2) Freschetta BBQ Recipe Chicken Pizza
3) Red Barron Pepperoni Pizza
4) Freschetta Chicken, Spinach & Mushroom Pizza

My verdict is that Freschetta BBQ Recipe Chicken Pizza could have beated the Red Barron Supreme Pizza if the celentro was not in the ingredients. Red Barron Pepperoni Pizza is a solid-quality pepperoni pizza that was very well to my licking, but the only 1 topping placed it in the 3rd place. Freschetta Chicken, Spinach & Mushroom Pizza takes the last place because all the other pizza varities just kicked it's veggy-loving ass, and chicken bits could not beat the taste of Red Barron's greasy pepperoni slices. If you like the traditional selections/toppings then go with Red Barron, but if you like the trendy/gourmet combinations then give Freshetta a try. Both brands are quality products and. both brands also had similar if not the same type of crust, which was not too thin, crispy and chevy; not your average generic pizza crust.

P.S. When I tried the 2nd box of Freshetta pizza, I found that there was coupons offer printed on the inverse of the box.



I cut it out and found out the coupon was expired, so I wrote a letter (email) to Freschetta brand:

"Can you please send me some Freschetta coupons in the mail because 3 days
ago I bought 2 boxes of By The Slice pizza, and both boxes had coupons inside
that expired on 11/30/2011 -Alex"

and they replied:

"Dear Alexander,

Thank you for your email. We apologize that our Freschetta Pizza by the Slice
Coupons were expired. We have forwarded this information to our Quality
Assurance Team so they are aware of your concern. We will also be sending you a
discount coupon so you can try our product again. You should receive this coupon
within 7-10 business days.

Thank you for writing, and please let us know if we can be of further
assistance. You can reach us at 1-800-544-6855 Monday through Friday, 7 a.m.
until 9 p.m. CST.

Sincerely,

*******
Consumer Affairs"

Additional images to upper review.

Alex, since you like frozen pizza as a subset of frozen foods in general, online shopping, AND kitchen clutter, I'd like to suggest you splurge for a Pizzazz Pizza Oven (available at Amazon.com and other fine resellers), and let us know how it works for you.

It's $39.95 or something, but it's designed specifically for frozen pizzas. Looks like it's got halogen heating elements on the top and bottom, and rotates the pizza in front of and away from the heating elements to warm and crisp it. The neat thing is the way it cooks the pizza in an open-air environment. The Pizzazz Pizza Oven gets great reviews, which is also a surprise.

Thanks for the product info. I really like the idea of this device but my kitchen is super-cluttered, I am even thinking of selling my griddler because it takes too much space. When I will have a bigger kitchen then I will buy it, I can even get it for free with my Amazon Rewards. My kitchen is really small, it is around 6'x8' feet. Checkout my new TGIF review of Prime Rib Stroganoff and be sure to checkout my product reviews on Amazon.

I think you should go ahead and get the Pizzazz Pizza Oven, if you eat enough frozen pizza. In the years I've been reading XPT and admiring the photos you take of the contents of your freezer, there's always been a few frozen pizzas in there. That's why I thought of you when I first heard of this device; seeing your made-over kitchen only confirmed that you NEED this.

Also, I note we've never seen a photo of the contents of your refrigerator. May the Admiral infer that you don't often eat things which are merely refrigerated instead of frozen? A good way to deal with that in a small kitchen is to get a full-sized freezer - also good for storing corpses.

I recently had a Freschetta® Simply Inspired™ frozen pizza and was quite pleased with it. It had more of a cracker-type crust, which I generally dislike. But in this case, it was combined with a good amount of cheese & toppings, so it was OK. Also, the thin crust reduces the amount of calories so I was able to eat the whole pie for dinner and still stay on a 2,000 calorie diet.

You can easily find them because they are packaged in environmentally-friendly plastic wrap, rather than horrible cardboard. Look it up, it's a selling point. Also, two American housewives (you know the type) behind me in line at the register both commented on the quality look of this pizza and how they'd like to try it in the future.

If you ever shop at Target, they sell a line of frozen pizzas labelled Archer Farms which are actually made in Italy and imported.

Greasy pepperoni. A lot of cheese. As if Gia needed some thinspiration. Very thoughtful.

Freschetta also has the distinction of having the only frozen pizza with a sauce that's actually got flavor to it. They even used to have a line with sauce stuffed in the crust.

The Simply Inspired line is pretty great, too.

I prefer the DiGiorno Supreme w/ rising crust.

There is just no room left to store any kitchen devices, and microwave and gas oven do okay job. I added the Pizzazz to my wish list though.



Here is the fridge, I cleaned it yesterday. Only had to throw out 1-gallon jar of pickles from Costco because I did not liked how they taste.

Enema equipment in the cupboard and the drained blood of victims in the fridge. Solid job.

Are you hoping that one of the trannys you screw will buy it for you? Do you still live with your mother?

I think we have the same fridge. The hinges on are different sides.

It is the standard fridge from sears. It come in at least 4 sizes, 4 colors and maybe some of them have hinges on different sides.

holy fuck you two...you actually think they sell fridges that only open one way?. go take a look and you'll notice the hinges and handles can be fit on either side.

you should try amys frozen pizza from fresh and easy.its gourmet style compared to most shit out there.

you guys and the frozen pizza shit... you do realize that you can buy pizza dough either at the store or your favorite independent pizza joint(sometimes they'll sell their sauce too) and make your own custom pizza that is worlds better than the frozen shit you're buying?.

Yup, Sears. Fuck, Lou, I didn't just fall off the meth wagon. I've bought major appliances in my day. It actually came with reversible hinges. It was originally configured with the hinges on the right, but I switched it because it fit the kitchen better. So there. Fucker.

I've never thought about asking to buy dough or sauce. I figure it's just the convenience of tossing it straight from the freezer to the oven. Sure, you're not getting handmade, but they choke down nicely. The best crust is the Totinos cheapos that we feed the Boy. The crust is a ton flakier than any other frozen one.

How about frozen burritos?

fair enough on the appliance... upon review it was panzer that was clueless..as usual.

and yes make real pizza fucker. especially if you have a kid. we used to do pizza night once a month and invite a bunch of people over and have everyone make their own individual pies on a couple of pizza stones. we'd lay out a bunch of chopped veggies and toppings with fresh mozzarella and cheddar. it's good stuff.

You initially said "ruble," didn't you.

A "real" pizza really requires an oven hotter than the ones we're allowed to have in our homes. Real pizza is cooked in a wood- or coal-fired stove that's around 1000° Fahrenheit, wherein the pizza dough is cooked and cheese is melted in about 90 seconds, two minutes puts a char on the crust, and three minutes has the fire department pulling up in front.

That oven weighs 3000 lbs, so it's hard to install in a Brooklyn walkup. The next best thing is obviously Totino's pizza turning away under the halogen heating element of a Pizzazz Pizza Oven.

I've done it though. By tricking the lock on my oven into operating in the cleaning cycle, I achieved 950°+ and a cook time of under two minutes. If you want to make an actual "Italian" pizza, it does have to be cooked in a wood-burning oven. And your dough ingredients can only be: Flour, water, yeast, & salt. I made one of my best pizzas ever this way.

Then I made an Italian calzone, which looks really cool because the insanely high temps cause the entire thing to blow up like a football. When pizzas/calzones are cooked at these temps, they achieve spots of char which are sometimes referred to as leoparding.

Unfortunately, I fucked the whole thing up afterwards. I went to wipe my pizza stone off with a slightly damp towel and got a drop of water on the super hot glass of the oven door and it all shattered. Technically, the whole operation was dangerous and you could probably burn your house down doing it.

Oh, I've made my own. Make dough in the bread machine. Even have a custom made pizza stone. Pizza stones rule. The Boy has horrid taste. He'll only each cheese pizza. His eating habits are the bane of my existence.

Actually, I should make mold for a pizza stone. Stoners love pizza.

Pizzazz device is Presto. We used to sell a lot of Presto items in Macy's in the $20-$40 range. It was popular 50% or so discount brand that used to do well during ODS and similar promos. It's a brand that is targeted to people that come shopping to Macy's on a train and that frequently buy pillows during ODS. If you buy at least 2 pillows on sale at Macy's then Presto-branded items are 80% likely for you [IMHO].

It really depends what your view of real pizza is. For me real pizza means real cheese (not that imitation crap that doesn't melts in the oven), real pizza sauce made with real tomatoes (not that pizza sauce that is made from apples and plums and flavored and dyed to taste like tomatoes), and a decent crust.

Pizza was designed as a cheap food affordable by dable to the masses, and I think that the manufacturing of the pizza should not be that complicated either. As long as real cheese, real sauce and the tasty taste is there; it is real pizza to me.

By the way, what do you think about the 2 Bros Pizza?

Since we are talking about pizzas here, then I got a preview of the next pizza review/battle:



It will be The Battle of the House Brands of individual pizza: team Food Basics (Waldbaum's/PathMark) vs team Stop & Shop. 3 pizza selections/toppings: cheese pizza, pepperoni pizza and supreme/deluxe. Who will win? Who will lose? Stay tuned to find out in the next 1-3 days.

I want to give some more kudos to the Archer Farms brand Italian pizzas from Target. Hand-made, Italian, wood-fired pizza. Normally when you look at the packaging for an item, it doesn't look the same inside. This pizza looks exactly like it does in this picture. Like someone made a decent, artisan-style pizza and then froze it. I can't remember how much it cost, but I seem to recall that it was on sale when I bought it. Plus, the label does say, "Tasty Food / Tasty Price."

Oh yeah, it actually really does taste good.

Looks like something in the $5.99-$6.99 range.

lol fucking jew bagel panzer.that looks really good steezo.

So i guess a fridge with an ice dispenser would completely baffle you guys right..??

Two Boots Pizza > 2 Brothers Pizza

As far as frozen pizza's, 1) Trader Joe margaritta pizza
and 2) Amy's brand frozen pizza

Two Boots is fucking gooood. I don't bother with frozen store pizzas. I live in a very Italian neighborhood and buy fresh pizzas once in a while when they are 2 for 1. Then I freeze the leftovers as single slice or doubles. Heat em up in the toaster oven with no tray, just on the rack.

If aliens ever decide to invade Earth I hope the first place they try to conquer is Panzer's kitchen. They will either hightail it to the other side of the universe or blast his apartment building with a death ray. Either way Earth wins.

It's my understanding that Aliens are into anal probing so it's the first likely choice !

Aliens interested in a cultural exchange with Panzer will bring over some frozen pizza and tranny disks.

We didn't notice Alex's quality drinking glasses. Would they be from the Arby's or McDonald's collection?

Christmas is coming up and we still haven't gotten the Food Basics v. Stop 'n Shop downmarket discount store-brand frozen pizza showdown. Is my family going to have to settle for goose again this year?

Oh, who am I kidding? I don't have a family, and I'm not going to have a Christmas dinner. On the 25th I expect to be completely stoned and humping away on a $5 prostitute in Siem Reap.

I am still busy writing the school projects that I have to hand it by 5pm tomorrow, this particular project that I am working on, I had to hand it in in all the way back in May. But I have lots of reviews in the works: I pretty much finished eating all the Smart Ones meal and took the notes on what to slip in the reviews.

If you haven't taken notes on the deuces created by each meal, then you are doing the viewers a disservice. The majority of posters here can't stand you, but I am convinced the lurkers and spiders cling to your every word.

God damn it all, Alex. Where the fuck are those frozen pizza reviews? I've been on tenterhooks this whole time.

There is not much to write about. From what I concluded is that: 1) all pizzas (Food Basics, Stop & Shop and Mr. P's) are made at the Mr. P's factory. They all taste, look, weight, and packaged pretty much the same. I could not tell the difference between them all. Mr. P's pizza could be slightly tastier, but I am not 100% sure because it can be a placebo effect. I think that Mr. P's factory just monkeyed-down on the taste of store brand pizzas. On the other hand maybe all 3 different brands are made at 3 different locations that all use the same production line that also uses the same standardized recipe for all the pizzas. My final verdict is that all 3 brands are the same, down to the tee.

I kinda have writer's block right now from all those writings of term papers and projects, and also from anticipation of the term grades. So far I got a B+ in the Import & Exports course, but I am waiting for the rest of the grades to show up in the system.

By writer's block, you mean constipation.

baby panzer/human garbage

^^^ Wow. That kid needs to start reviewing salads & Lean Cuisines or he won't make it to 20. He's like Cartman from SouthPark in the episode about World of WarCraft.

He looks like he'll stroke out any minute.

I try to stop at a Target once a month just to make sure I have some Archer Farms brand cereal around my house. That stuff is the best cereal I've ever had and it's made with whole grains so is healthy too. It comes in a cardboard box box that has a flip top lid on it, so the cereal stays fresh longer.

Just as healthy as designer health food cereal brands like Kasha, tastes better, and cheaper too.

Why??

You can't read the rest of that post yourself.

Battlefield 2 Special Forces time

I can and it's patently obvious that this and the other questionable posts evince a design to kill us all with blandness.

In sum, you fscking suck and you know it. Stop trying, stop posting already.

Please and Thank You,

JB

When you asked why a few posts up I thought it was Panzer at first and I was all set to bash him and let him know that some people eat healthy food and don't shovel whatever crap they can get for $1 into their mouth.

JB's still hanging onto every word I say and it tickles me pink...

LOL, I've made 10 fucking posts in like the last 3 months and now my designs to kill everybody on the board with them have been exposed!

Me thinks JB assigns higher import to my posts than they really possess. But, I'm flattered nonetheless.

I'm going to embellish my usual typographical and grammatical errors with additional typographical and grammatical errors so he can start bitching again about those too.

I might have underestimated XPT. Starting posting here again might be fun after all.

Great. Please post *MORE* bullshit so we can further rejoice in your inanity.

The fact that this takes place in a Panzer thread serves but to underscore how inane you are.

Seriously, how banal can you get?

back on topic,you should try the four pack of kirkland brand cheese pizza from costco.great pizza and you can add your own toppings.grab some of their salami or make a hawaiin pizza.

Damn JB, 7 minutes later. You really are hanging onto every word.

Wow, Nothrust, way to recycle other's arguments.

The fact is, it don't work for you. Try again.

You're right, that fat kid looks positively cadaverous, wheezing away in front of his monitor.

The sad part is, any American with a freezer, a small toaster oven and a small frying pan can eat a great freshly-prepared meal for about a dollar. It really helps if you like chicken.

I've seen frozen boneless, skinless chicken breasts for as low as $1.30 per pound, if you buy 50 pounds of 'em. That's about four chicken breasts per pound, cost per serving not even 35¢. In human-sized purchases of two or three pounds, that stuff is still only about 50¢ per serving.

Salt, pepper, a little bit of oil -- sauteed chicken breast always hits the spot.

For starch, have a white potato, sweet potato, or some rice. You could pick up a sweet potato for about a nickel. A little butter on that might add another nickel. If I were the fat kid, I might think about skipping the butter but in small portions, fat is where the flavor is.

Probably you'd want another vegetable, and here is where canned vegetables help with the budget. What's a can of corn these days? Sixty cents or so? There are probably at least four servings per can.

One could do the same with that chicken breast (mmm, chicken parm!), some spaghetti and a jar of sauce, or make his own sauce with a can of diced tomatoes. A dollar makes a lot of delicious, healthy meals if you're willing to put 20-30 minutes of your own time into it.

I'm pretty well off myself, so I'm not into the dollar-per-serving homecooked meal out of necessity. Rather, as I've learned to cook I've come to realize that the cost of restaurant meals basically means paying off someone else's staff and mortgage costs, plus a nice profit for them. I'd rather keep the money for my drug habits, thank you very much.

The food reviewer kid looks so pitiful, with his greasy, unkempt hair, pimply face, and grey pallor. Reviewing Lean Cuisine ain't gonna get it done for him. He needs physical training plus a balanced diet with fewer calories than he uses per day.

What that fat kid really needs is five months at Parris Island (13 weeks basic training plus two months in the Physical Conditioning Platoon), but unfortunately in his current condition he's ineligible to enlist. He needs to lose about 70 lbs. before he could go.

Our schools are really fucked up. When I was in elementary school we had PE, plus a gruff coach who told us to move our little candy asses. By the time I got to high school the self-esteem goofs had taken over, and now there's nobody to help this kid by telling him the cold, hard truth: You don't want to be a fat-ass. It's NOT normal, and I'm going to help you fix your problem. The new Oprah-fied schools wouldn't dare.

The good news is, he's 16 years old and therefore probably reads this forum religiously.

Elementary schools nowadays send notes home from the nurse, that your child is obese and it poses a health risk. I don't know for sure, but I'd imagine they do follow up of some sort, asking what you've tried to do. I have also read/heard stories in the past few months of Child Services removing grossly over weight toddlers from their homes. Its one thing being fat and active, another when you roll over in bed and start wheezing from the activity.

Although I'm generally of a Clint Eastwood "Leave People The Fuck Alone" bent, I believe in mandatory PT at school administered by a tough-love drill sergeant or bulldyke coach, at least an hour every day. This kid should get two. There is no reason this kid should be so fat. And there are so many millions more like him.

It's really a shame that ordinary folks, with two parents working, so rarely cook at home anymore. Nobody knows how to cook anything, which may explain the rise of the "celebrity chef" as a person with special, magical knowledge. I was in a grocery store recently and just noticed that Oscar Meyer now sells packaged, pre-cooked bacon strips. Really? People can't even cook up bacon anymore?

Fuck me, I cure and smoke the stuff myself. I'm getting pretty goddamn rustic.

They should send the notes sooner. You should see how fat a kid has to be to be considered obese.

The lowest that I seen chicken breast go was for $1.80/lb in 25-lb cases in that wholesale place near HomeDepot close to the bridge that goes to Manhattan. The only thing is that you need tax id to buy from this wholesale place.

I a fucking sick with everyone promoting healthy eating and all kinds of regiments of diets, go green, natural and save-the-earth causes. I am so sick of these things that I just don't give a fuck about them and just eat whatever I like and feel good about it. I know one thing: that all the companies just want to make a profit, but the fast food/frozen food companies at least try to make their meals tasty.

Healthy food = food that does not taste good.
Fast food = food that tastes great.

I am a fat guy and I approve this message.

If you cook it yourself, you can make it as tasty as you want.

Cooking takes time, and at the end of the day when I am tired, cooking is the last thing that is on my mind. I guess that this applies to most people.

Maybe they gotta make frozen foods more fun: with more prizes, flashier graphics, with stickers inside and more limited editions.

They should make stuff like with video game themes, like Battlefield: Special Forces brand of frozen foods, I'd buy that.

When I'm tired, the last thing I want is food. Just sleep and being left alone.

But if you're the type who wants food, how about preparing something ahead of time for after a long day? Example, salad lasts up to 3 days...wait, the stuff you eat has an infinite shelf life, I forgot.

I would think that eating at the end of day when a guy's all tuckered out might have a wee bit to do with the fatness. Going to bed with a gullet full of grease can't be good.

You don't want no sleep; you want an enema! - pun on Hot Pockets commercial.

Nah, you sleep better after you eat something. I always (like 80% of the time) have a sandwich and warm tea before I sleep.

It's all in your mind. Just have the warm tea. In a few days, you'll be used to just having that at night. If you truly can't deal on those first few nights, that's where doctor prescribed sleeping pills or benzos come in.

I don't eat breakfast.

Just eat fruit if you're not into the breakfast thing. It helps immensely.

No thanks. I'll just grab a hot pocket.

Smoothies make for a quick, easy & healthy breakfast. I buy a big bag of mixed blueberries, raspberries and blackberries. Then a separate bag of frozen strawberries. All organic, of course.

In a blender I'll put a fresh banana, a little container of Yoplai Light, a half cup of low-fat milk (or almond milk), half a cup of acai juice, then a half cup of the frozen mixed berries and half cup of frozen strawberries. Blend it until it's smooth and indulge.

I was never sold on smoothies until I made one of these. I literally felt like I had been injected with an energy-releasing drug.

Killing all those black tranny hookers is tiring for you? You're really out of shape.

If you are too tired to cook, why not take some of your ebay profit and mail order a woman from the home land, then beat her until she's a good cook, just like they do in the Ukraine.

How many schools have PE these days ???

I usually had my mom get me doctor's notes so I didn't have to do P.E.

...and now you exercise your ass off !

im sure most of them wouldnt like all the weird shit based crap hes into so itd be a deal breaker.

Jesus, that kid is a dead ringer for a weed dealer that I know. Like, it looks EXACTLY like him.

PE and exercise are two very different things. PE is as close to Lord of the Flies territory that real life gets.

We've gotten into store brand frozen lasagnas when we go to see the Pot Snobs of Pend Orielle County. No prep. Throw them in the oven and continue smoking. Next round I'll start doing some reviews.

Barry,

If you're really into lasagna, I suggest trying the Cook's Illustrated quick lasagna recipe. The goal was to make a passable lasagna without spending the whole day in the kitchen. When I made it, it took about 45 min. of prep time and about the same amount of time in the oven. And it was way better than any store-bought frozen crap.

http://www.tru-burn.com/Recipes/CI/Lasagna.pdf

Oh, I actually do a great lasagna, if I do say so. I don't boil the pasta, which is a huge effort saver. Fresh homemade and frozen both have their place. When I'm sitting around the smoking table I'm not feeling kitchen creative. I'm more throw it in the oven and come get it later.

So, you use no-boil lasagna noodles, or just regular noodles without boiling them? This recipe specifically calls for the use of no-boil noodles. Shit, if all lasagna noodles are ever used for is to bake in a lasagna casserole, who do they even make both boil and no-boil noodles? I couldn't taste the difference.

I used no boil ones once. Then I saw something on the Food Network or somewhere about not boiling the regular ones. Works great. I think the no boil ones are a scam, because they tasted the same, had the same consistency, everything. I don't buy the no boil anymore. Just the regular works great.

Pend Oreille County! Talk about getting away from it all. Is that pot-snob country?

Snip the rest and snip anything in support of this theory of saving effort on lasagna.

Lasagna is nothing BUT effort. It's designed to feed many people. This is where you go big or go home. Full stop.

Having said that, I'm particularly ashamed at Barry, 'cause I've never known a stoner chef who would willingly take the easy way when otherwise avoidable.

bout to throw a kirkland brand pizza in.just cheese but maybe dunk it in some marinara with parm.

i dont think ive ever made lasagna before.not boiling it first seems like the way to go.do they actually sell ricotta at the grocery?ive seen it made on tv and it seems easy.might just have to get the stuff to make it sometime.

I've tried it both ways. I spent a whole day following a recipe for northern Italian lasagna a while back. I was boiling noodles and making tiny meatballs and all sorts of shit all day long. It was OK. The Cook's Illustrated quick lasagna recipe I posted tasted just as good and I was eating it an hour and a half after I started.

I'm German-Irish and was schooled in the culinary arts, from an early age, by Sicilians, which makes me the Tom Hagan of the kitchen.

Trust me, the slower approach is best. In the kitchen and in everything else.

It's like the old bull winking at the young bull and saying "Let's walk down there..."

Yeah, I can cook too. I'm currently trying to decide whether to make a pizza with the dough that's been slowly fermenting in the fridge for the past 3 days or plop an Allen Brothers steak burger into the sous vide machine for a USDA Prime Steezeburger ™.

Slower is definitely the way to go when making pizza or bread dough. And BBQ should take forever. I'm not sold on the payoff for all-day lasagna though. Do you have a favorite recipe?

I'm a chef, but not a stoner chef. Getting high is purely relaxational. I'm lazy as fuck high. I can't be creative at all when I'm stoned.

I'm not totally sure if they're in PO county, but you probably get the general idea. It's like the guys on Moonshiners. Back to the Earthers with some meth cooks and addicts thrown in for flavor. Some real characters. I'm actually kind of putting together notes for a book, cuz some of these folks are something else. Everyone and their uncle are growing. Not a lot of boutique strains, but some fine product. The people we hang with don't grow, but folks are always slipping them weed. And they're such snobs. When there's no more green in the bowl, they're done with it. It's an "ass hit...load another one". And I'm horrified, because I smoke until there's nothing left to burn. Fucking pot5 snobs.

Yeah, it's getting away fror me. It's not quite going to Nelson, BC, but it's a close second. My cell doesn't work, no one hassles me. No one even really knows where I am. Couldn't live there. I like delivered Thai food too much. But when the world is kicking my balls harder than usual it's a nice fortress of solitude, as it were.

Damn! When I scraped the bowl, I'd save the resin and other leavins for a rainy day or to sprinkle in a doobie. These people probably throw the stem away rather that bother to clean it.

Well, There's a couple, but a LOT of recipies are regional-specific, and you're in one motherfucking specific region so YMMV. (My Dad -least-chef-like-bastard-of-my-acquaintance- was often stuck on KP in your neck of the woods and his gripes make sense, in this context.)





Don't piss on my leg and tell me it's raining, fucknuts. You're both and it's cool.

Since this is a pizza thread, I'm gonna get all chefy here and post some recent pies. First is tonight's dinner: Curried King Crab Pizza. I had leftover crab from Christmas dinner, so it went to good use. I know that eye-talians say you shouldn't mix seafood with cheese, but fuck it. The white blobs are whole-milk ricotta.



Then, there was yesterday's breakfast pie. If you can make a good pizza, you can eat it for basically every meal. This one was serrano ham, sautéed mushrooms & eggs. I shoulda taken another pic after I broke the yolks.



And then a more traditional pie.

I made my own lasagna couple of years ago without the ricotta.

These are pizzas you made, Steezo? The crust on the bottom pizza (the pepperoni) looks positively fantastic. A little bit of char on the crust is my ideal.

Yeah, I made all of those. Pizza is my hobby and it's one of the things that got me into cooking. There are soooo many variables that go into making pizza dough: flour type, the percentage of water in the dough, the amount & type of yeast, whether to add honey or sugar, whether to add oil, how long you let it rise, etc. And then there's the oven you use and the temperature and the time. Basically, you want the hottest oven possible to get the dough to "spring" up and make a light tasting crust.

A hot oven also lets you cook the pizza quickly so the crust won't become dry inside. Adding oil & sugar helps the crust brown when your oven isn't super hot. There's a whole bunch of shit that goes into making a good pie, but really the Italians figured it out a long time ago. A dough made of just flour, water, salt & yeast cooked in a 1,000 degree oven for about 90 seconds. I only achieved this one time when I tricked my oven door into letting me open it when it was operating on the cleaning cycle. Then I dripped some liquid onto the glass of the oven door, shattering it. :-(

This is my one and only neapolitan-style pizza pie. The toppings are reindeer sausage & mushrooms, so that clearly isn't traditional.



I made a calzone at the same time. In a super hot oven, a real Italian calzone will puff up like a football from the heat.



And since I'm posting my pizza pics, here was a really good shrimp pie. Again, I mixed seafood with cheese.

Fixed.

I made my own lasagna a couple of years ago without the ricotta because it cost more than $2.

...and I don't need to hear anything else.

Some on this board know that when I was a young pervert, I paid my way through school cooking, and, yes, that included spinning pies in NYC.

Thousands of 'em.

The best goddamned pies in the world come out of NYC, but, after years of talking with expatriate pizza chefs, I've concluded that the rumor is true: It's the water. Just like the fucking bagels.

Having said that, Steezo's homemade efforts look, well, goddamned good from my practiced eye, and a damned sight better than what Gunker used to post.

Are they picture perfect? No. But he ain't claiming it. What they've got, though, is that here-it-is-je-ne-se-quoi what buries Panzer Pies, any day.

^^^ I think that was a compliment, so thank you. Really, you said it all when you said the pies have that "here-it-is-je-ne-se-quoi." I'm not a chef, I just like to cook. But my technique of cooking food has reached a point where what I cook has a distinct flavor and tastes like something that was cooked by ME. It just has that certain "here-it-is-je-ne-se-quoi." So, thanks again.

Btw, if I lived somewhere other than Alaska, I'd have a wood-burning pizza oven and would be cranking out pies that could hang with the best of them. No New York water for me. Just Dasani filtered, bottled water. I'd use local tap water, but I've heard that fluoride can mess with the yeast.

It should mess with about everything in your body. Alex Jones can't be wrong. Fine work there. Just the mushrooms on the second one featuring them look a bit old. Mushrooms tend to change their taste when they open up. It's the spores.

Frozen: Not Baked

Sir, I've fed Gian Jerkins octopus. You can be sure it's a compliment.

As to the water, though, it's an indisputable fact. Growing up in NYC, you always hear it anecdotally. But I wound up living in haight-ashbury selling acid to hippie tourists* for a few months in the early '90s (LONG story) and, yadda-yaadda-yadda there's this place on Haight called Escape From New York Pizza.

I walk in there and find out it's run by an ex-cop from Brooklyn who knows exactly what he's doing (as I'm talking to himself) and he says 'try this.' I take a slice, I look at him, he looks at me and we nod, 'cause it's that thing we always hear about...


"It's the water."





*My employers, throughout the years, have always been aware of this, for those who wanna rake muck...

Just "special" water won't give you a good pizza. Good raw material is so a must. I'd keep it mostly simple and pay up for the good stuff. Organic seems to work pretty well. Good year and all.

You just confused Tritone and Panzer with that word. They're sitting there now trying to figure out if it's really pronounced Jenny Sea Kooey.

Ummmm, yeah, I don't think I'm going to be the only one to tell you there's nothing "special" about NYC tap water, and it's certainly not "organic."

It does, though, make the difference, as does altitude (Hello, Denver) and some other factors that weren't relevant to the SF discussion but apply more to other towns (Chicago, DC...)

Flip side of the coin: They have sourdough...

All this by the slice business hopefully isn't playing out to the detriment of freshness, like directly from the oven. Key factor.

I'll put it to you, Greg: Have YOU ever had a slice directly from a NYC oven? I think not. I'm wagering your whine's the only thing that's crossed the Rhine.

See, the thing with the mushrooms is, I pre-cook them. Fresh mushrooms on a pizza = water everywhere. Mushrooms release all kindsa water when they're hit by heat. The one pic of my neapolitan-style pizza has fresh, uncooked mushrooms. That pizza was in the oven for such a short time that it didn't really matter. Anyway, this is just yet another of the endless variables that go into making a great pie.

And into referential mode again. It's the difference between US and Italian pizza. I guess both can be good. It's just like with bread, the freshly-baked aroma doesn't last very long.

The fact that alaskans understand pie more than californians is gonna make me chuckle for days.

^^^ It's not an Alaskan thing. I'm Greek. As far as food-service goes, Greeks are the Mexicans of Europe. I hope that made sense.

Neither does your relevance and, in a day, you've exhausted your supply for 2012. Go figure.

On one level it does. I've mentioned before that I spent a number of years in the food service industry.

At the same time, it makes no sense because I have never seen a Greek or person of Greek decent ever make any Italian food I'd ever eat.

I'm sorry. That's just the way it is. Which makes me question how Greek you are*, since that pie looked decent.




*This should not be taken to mean "How 'advanced' is your sexuality.

Well shoot,

I'd say that 50%+ of the Italian restaurants in Anchorage are owned by Greeks. And, in general, we work well in kitchens. I don't know what else to say.

You said it all by saying "Anchorage." There's nothing else for you to say.

Having said that myself, though, I'll add that some of the best goddamn chefs I've ever worked beside in NYC were Greek born or of Greek decent...


...you guys simply cook Italian.

And, for what it's worth, and for the record, your Alaskan Greek Pie looks better than Gunker's Portland Pizza.

It isn't just the water. I'm sure NYC Papa John's sucks as bad as Indiana Papa John's, but it is the water that separates NYC baked goods (pizza, bagels, bread) from elsewhere. I saw a news segment once on a bagel guy in Florida that set up a mini treatment system to try and make the water there like NYC's. All the old retired New Yorkers in his area made the shop a success.

No expert by any means, but your pies are very good looking, steez. The king crab one would be right up my alley. I might have to take a stab at something like that.

Is that the Brooklyn Water Bagel Co.? Larry King has a big stake in it and whenever he's on a show he pimps some 14 stage water machine they use to make things taste just like in Brooklyn. And they're HQ'd and most of the locations are in Florida.

I'd guess so. It was a while back, and I don't remember the name. But yeah, if you want to be specific, Brooklyn baked goods are better than the other boroughs.

share your magic steezo,i know you said the ingredients,but what amount.also what temperature and do you know how i can get the dough to taste similar to papa johns(i.e. sweetness)?im guessing sugar but itd have to be the right amount.

I'd rather not post the whole recipe. But, a good start would be to get the cookbook American Pie by Peter Reinhart. They are about 20 different types of dough recipes in there.

I'll see if I can find a recipe for a Papa John's dough for you. I know they do put a lot of sugar into both the dough and the sauce. I'm a diabetic and I literally cannot take enough insulin to eat their pizza.

steez... that breakfast pie and all the others for that matter look fucken delicious.

figgs..http://www.redrocksunrise.com/recipes/Papa%20Johns%20Pizza%20Dough%20Recipe.htm

It's called high fructose corn syrup and whatever other fake food crap poor people aka fat asses like yourself pretend is food.

Organic raw pizza doesn't work.

Actually, I don't like raw pizza. Fine, if you're into fresh tomato sauce and sliced veggies on bread (raw bread is usually made from seeds and very tasty), but I'd rather eat other raw meals. Vegan pizza is hit or miss. Depends on the cheese. Some places pull it off. Not sure what cheese they use. Padova could answer this one.

Often vegan cheeses used is a mix of tapioca and arrowroot flour with some oils like coconut oil, safflower oil, yeast and xanthum gum to give it the cheesy texture. Kinda funk nasty in my opinion. Or made of soy which is more gross. If you're gonna be Vegan, just eat the foods of the damn earth instead of this crap.

^^^ co-sign. i was vegan for 2 years, and found other things more interesting to eat than that. some restaurants can pull off vegan cheese as an ingredient, but i had no interest in buying vegan cheese, trying to emulate cheese dishes. i found so many other vegan dishes so tasty. especially years later when i got into raw vegan. you know, actual veggies, fruits i was now eating more of. you'd be surprised at how many vegetarians and vegans load up on simple carbs and lack fruits and veggies. currently, i eat mostly raw vegan and occasionally meat. i'm way healthier than when i was vegan or veg simply because my diet is mostly uncooked vegs/fruits.

Organic then, I guess. The other stuff tastes odd mostly, might look okay though. It's highly ideologically laden in any case. Mention it around the preachers of mild oral chemotherapy and it's on.

I've made decent pizza dough using only salt, water, olive oil, yeast, and just a pinch of sugar to give some "food" for the yeast to use. Commercial pizza shops may add some sugar to their dough but I suspect they also add it to their tomato sauce.

Italians (and Argentines and Uruguayans by extension) make a pizza-type food called "fainá," using chick pea flour. Might make an interesting pie.

Fainá - estilo uruguayo

Fainá or Farinata

thanks for that gia,im sorry im not as cultured as ex whores.and lou thanks for the recipe.

Gotta love it when the pretentious come down from on high to remind us how bad we're living.

hey man... i just googled that recipe for him. wtf?.

He might have meant Gia when she went on about food simulations. She actually has a point. Coloring agents are okay and fit for single malt scotch, for example. Why? Vegetables which tend to look good and are almost tasteless. Why? Meat laden with hormones and it's meant to be all fine and harmless. Why? Why, why, why? It's quite simple, actually. Get the good stuff, pay up. Be cheap and get mildly poisoned. The more stubborn among the poor know this and get angry.

Simp, is that you?

That's what I meant. At least the first part. But I do like it when pretentious Lou comes down from on high to dump on us too.

Anyone have an opinion on Papa Murphy's Take and Bake? I've never tried it myself, but it might be a nice switch from the occasional frozen pie. As far as fast-food pizza places go, I usually limit myself to Round Table. I did try an Artisan pizza from Domino's not that long ago and found it to be OK, in that it had a fairly light crust and not a huge amount of heavy toppings.

Whoever Simp was or is, isn't me.

I like Papa Murphy's. They're better than the chains and about 5 steps up from frozen. They'll substitute with no hassle and are pretty liberal with toppings.

its good,they opened up one down the street an i got a freebie just for walking in.everything tastes pretty fresh and the dough gets nice and crunchy.they have a decent amount of variety and i think they might make custom pies too.

They'll do custom. I agree with the freshness. It's kind of Subwayish. You watch it being built. They have a pepper sauce that's great. Almost a glaze. Very tasty and has a nice bite to it.

I'm only seeing 3 sauces listed on their website menu:

"Choose your Sauce:
Traditional Red Sauce | Herb Tomato | Creamy Garlic"

Maybe I'll give one of their thin crust deLITE pizza's a try with the garlic sauce.

Steezo, if you've got a pizza stone, the Papa Murphy's Take-N-Bake is probably a good option. It's not an incredibly delicious pizza, but that's not its selling point. Freshness is the Papa Murphy's selling point. Possibly price is a close second. For the quantity of toppings, and the variety, it is hard to beat a Papa Murphy's shopping for yourself.

I'm interested for a number of reasons. My own homemade shit is obviously better, but it's a lot of work and I always have leftover toppings. I like frozen pizza sometimes because if I pick the right kind, I can eat the whole thing and keep it to around 1,000 calories. But. even with the best frozen pizza, the crust always tastes somewhat cardboard-ey.

My next goal with my homemade pizza is to weigh and measure everything out just right to make a 1,000 calorie pizza using all fresh ingredients. The nice thing about being able to make a really good dough is that it you can stretch it to be about as thin as you want. I've always felt that a good dough, stretched out super-thin, resembles the skin of a bat's wing. You'd have to make your own pizza dough to know what I'm talking about.

I worked in a Pizzeria for a few years in college. Figure at least one 50 lb sack of flour per day, I must have made, minimum, twenty tons of dough.

I have no idea what you're talking about.

Well, the dough is alive for one thing. When you stretch it, it looks and feels kind of like thinly stretched skin...like a bat's wing. The thinly stretched out dough has gluten strands that look just like the fibers in the skin of the pic below. If you don't know what I'm talking about, I don't know what to say. It makes sense to me. Maybe you never stretched your dough out as thin.

[img]http://forum.jerkoffzone.net/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php?ubb=download&Number=44972&filename=bat's%20wing.jpg[/img]

No. I've simply never stretched a bat wing before.

Oh, well I stayed at a summer house once that was infested with bats, so I guess I just had a chance to look at them up close. It looks really similar. I don't know why that pic won't show up in my post, but I also don't really care.

im sure every guy has had to stretch a batwing at one point or another.

I've seen some Turks in a pastry shop roll out some dough so thin and elastic looking, you would swore it was intestine. Then the roll up some spinach and cheese or meat and onions in it. The meat/onion variety tastes ok, but is like drinking a cup of sulfuric acid the damn heartburn it gives me.

It comes on their Thai Chicken deLite. They'll put it on anything, tho.