Pizza Hut: BBQ Civil War

Pizza Hut have two pizzas with barbecue sauce on instead of tomato. Do you give a shit which one's the best? Of course you don't, but carry on reading anyway because that time's not going to kill itself is it? It's way too jolly.

On the left hand side we have the BBQ Steak. He's got chicken, steak and onions. It was a pretty good combination, and I got over excited and started eating before I took the above photo. That's why there's a teeth shaped hole in one of the slices. It's not because the delivery man got peckish on his way over and hoped no one would notice. I wouldn't have blamed him for having a cheeky chomp but I would have noticed and chased him back to Pizza Hut like Robert Patrick in Terminator 2, latching onto the back of his moped with my liquid metal fists and killing his ass.

On the right it's the New York Meatball. Something about having 'New York' as a prefix makes a food automatically sound tastier. I'm not sure why this is. American cuisine could be considered a slow form of suicide. The yummiest suicide mind you, but suicide nonetheless. Incidentally, one you're all bearing witness to right now, AND YET DOING NOTHING TO PREVENT. Hope your bags are packed because I just sent you on a guilt trip. Zing.

After much consideration I've decided my favourite was the BBQ Steak. I think that's because it's toppings were most in keeping with the barbecue theme. I don't know whether this means consistency is an attribute I value in my pizzas or whether, if the government were made up of pizzas, I'd vote Tory because I hate progressive pizzas (This won't be why because I love wacky pizzas, look). Either way BBQ Steak, I crown you 'king of the Pizza Hut pizzas with barbecue sauce instead of tomato', a trophy you can proudly place next to your trophy for 'being a pizza that exists' and 'getting digested frequently'. Bravo you cheesy scoundrel, bravo.

Pizza Quest vs Papa John

As far as high street pizza delivery companies go I've always had soft spot for Papa John's. Unlike Domino's their pizzas don't taste like they should have a "Made from 100% Recycled Materials" stamp on the base, and unlike Pizza Hut I don't feel like I'm committing a cardinal sin against blood pressure when I eat one. Look, here's me being pretty happy with a Papa John's. That said, I have recently been on the wrong end of a rather nasty trait within Papa John's delivery policy: laziness. Now I know this is a bit like Josef Fritzel calling the NSPCC because he doesn't like the way his next door neighbour shouts at his kids, but humongous hypocrisy aside, for a pizza DELIVERY company Papa John's sure hate DELIVERING.

Here's the premise: I was at work, I wanted a pizza, I went to Papa John's website to order one, I was told I was outside of their delivery area, I thought this must be a mistake because there is a Papa John's literally five minutes away, so I e-mailed them.

From: Me
To: Papa John's


If I was on a moped, it would literally take me 5 minutes to get from your store to my house yet somehow I am still 'outside' the delivery area. May I suggest upgrading from horse drawn carriages to actual motorised vehicles so that you can deliver to people outside your immediate eyeline. You cannot be serious.

P.s. http://pizza-quest.blogspot.com I will bury you 'John', BURY YOU!!!

 *******

From: Papa John's
To: Me

Dear Joe,
Thank you for your recent email.

In order for me to fully investigate this matter I would be grateful if you could recontact me with your full postcode.

Once I am in receipt of this information I will then be in a position to fully investigate this matter and respond to you accordingly.

In the meantime I would like to thank you for bringing this matter to our attention and I look forward to hearing from you in due course.

*******

From: Me
To: Papa John's

Yes, hello.

The address I was ordering from was E8 2PB. Good old Google maps says it would take a whopping five minutes to drive there from the store. I'm curious as to what the cut off point in journey time is for a trip to not be worth it? 4 minutes? 3 minutes? The few seconds of airtime a pizza thrown like a frisbee has before landing?

Forgive the whole "bury you" threats on my previous e-mail, I was just really hungry. REALLY hungry.

Joe

*******

From: Papa John's
To: Me

Dear Joe,

Thank you for recontacting me with the information I requested.

I have now had the opportunity of investigating this matter and I can confirm that your address lies just outside of the specified delivery area for this outlet.

Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience that this may have caused you however Im sure you will appreciate that a boundary has to be imposed at some point.

Please do not hesitate to contact me should you require any further information.

Kind regards,

*******

From: Me
To: Papa John's

Dear *****,

Thanks for getting back to me. I understand that there has to be some kind of boundary, but it's not like I was ordering a pizza while sitting in my little wooden shack in the Himalayas. I was literally five minutes away. I mean, why bother having a phone ordering service at all when, to get it delivered, people have to be so close to the store they could just shout their order at you? You could save a fortune on phone line rental; money that perhaps could be put towards hiring a second delivery boy, maybe this time one without a crippling case of agoraphobia.

 I'd be very interested to know where the 'imposed' boundary of the Hoxton Street branch lies. This is my local Papa John's you see, (that's 'local' as in the generally accepted definition of 'being within the same geographical area', not the Papa John's definition, which is apparently 'being within arms reach without having to stretch too much, or get out of my warm, comfy chair '). I very much look forward to hearing from you.

 Regards,

               Joe

*******

This was last week, and since then I ain't heard shit.

Enrico's Pizza (5788 Frantz Road, Dublin, OH)

Hype: We needed some redemption pie. Last week we got to judge a home made pizza contest by CMH Gormand. It was fun and everyone was really cool but most of the pizzas they made sucked. We ate 12 slices and 3 or 4 were good. It hurt the next day. This time were would visit Enrico's--the famous NW Columbus pizza stronghold.

Scene: We counted at least three generations working. Two old ladies, a middle aged lady, an old dude, a bunch of middle aged dudes, and some kids. This is certainly a family joint. There was even a family or two getting some pizza while we were there. We're all about that kind of stuff.
The Pie:
Crust- FANTASTIC. Crusty-crunchy-toasty on the bottom. Filled with integrity, like the Enrico family, yet a little doughy as it approached the sauce. A little thicker than other awesome NW Columbus pizza crusts. This was superb.
Sauce- A let down. Maybe just tomato sauce from the can with no spices, seriously.
Cheese- Very plentiful and good. Traditional pizza cheese just right.
Peps- Medium/thick cut, spicy and salty. Cupped in the heat of the oven which caused mild toasting at the rims. I liked it.

Overall: This pie was very good. A slightly bigger both in width and depth than most NW Columbus pizzas but it still fits the mold quite well. I see why people from Dublin and Hilliard like it so much. 15 inch larges. 4/5 pies.

Bloomsbury Bowling Lanes: New York Hot

In the photo, on the corner of the table, that's a regular box of Tic-Tacs. As you can see, this pizza was huge. 26" in fact. In dick terms that's about four and a half average male dicks or twenty-six average Danny Devito dicks. That's a lot of Danny Devito dicks. I was going to go on to how it tasted but I realise that's going to sound a bit gay straight* after all the dick talk, so I'll chat about bowling instead. Bloomsbury Bowling Lanes is in west London, near Holborn and Russell Square. They have this whole 50's Americana vibe going on, which is fine except some of the bowling equipment is actually from the 50's and looks so old it's about to explode. The conveyer belt that brings you your bowling balls back nearly resulted in us getting our fingers crushed about ten thousand times. I guess all the danger adds to the wild thrill that is the extreme sport of ten-pin bowling. Surprising no one, I suck at bowling.

They have a diner there with actual, leather-lined booths and everything on the menu is stereotypically american. Hot dogs, burgers, corn dogs, religious fundamentalism, milkshakes, French toast, basically anything a yank away from yankland could want. Most importantly though, they have 26" pizzas. I have to confess, and I don't know whether this will cost me respect or perhaps earn me some: I didn't eat this pizza all by myself. I had help. But only from a girl which is almost as good as no help at at all, amirite lads? Lads? Chest bump?

You'd think the issue of quality over quantity would arise with pizza like this, but it didn't because this pizza was really, really good. And massive which meant there was a lot of the good to be had. I was tempted to give this 10 out of 10 but I'm kind of reluctant to because I think I'm saving my first 10 out of 10 for a pizza that I just 'know' is the one. Bloomsbury Bowling Lanes pizza, I can't marry you but you will always be a immensely important pizza in my life. Always.

9 out of 10  

*"gay straight" LOL.

The Orange: Regina

At the moment 'The Orange' have an offer where you can get any pizza for £4.99. Orange are good at offers. 'Orange Wednesdays' made Wednesday my third favourite day of the week. My favourite is Thursdays because it means it's almost the weekend and, like Christmas, the real fun is in the anticipation. Sundays are my second favourite because you're encouraged by God to be lazy. I think one of the cons of being Jewish, besides never being able to lick a pig, would be having your Sabbath on a Saturday. It must suck having to sit around putting effort into not doing anything while at the same time your less Yiddish friends are running around having a blast, probably eating hot dogs and having sex without  a blanket in the way. But then I guess you'd get to go wild on Sundays so it all balances out.

In Orange all the staff wear these disgusting lime green sweatshirts with matching New Era caps. Most of them seem to be typical Hackney yoofs, sporting delightful almost-beards and some pretty imaginative ways of wearing their caps. One guy had perched it so far forward on his head that it was covering his eyes and he must have been operating the till by detecting rebounding soundwaves.  He was Daredevil if Daredevil had chosen to sell pizza instead of being a ninja.

I was pleasantly surprised with this pizza. They actually had a proper pizza oven and for a cheap takeaway pizza the base wasn't a total stodge fest. Sadly it's on Kingsland Road, almost directly opposite where I work which means it could end up being way too convenient, so the chances of me finally becoming a supreme fatty are looking pretty high.

I should perhaps point out that Orange the phone people have nothing to do with Orange the pizza place. They just have the same name. I wouldn't want anyone making an idiot of themselves because they tried to negotiate margerhitas into their talk plan after I'd misled them.

7 out of 10

Also posted on CuiZine

Fear and Loathing in Old Town East: Yellow Brick Pizza, 892 Oak St, Columbus, OH

Hype: Everybody's talking about this place. We think it's just because there's nothing else going on in Old Town East. Lots of cool people with nowhere to hang out. Let's see if it lives up to the legend.

Scene: Kitschy 8x10s of Charles Bronson, Charles Barkley, and a Young Charlie Sheen line the walls with at least two Beatles posters and an ad for the Ohio Roller Girls. I guess the management admires Liz Lessner's ability to make CCAD grads feel right at home while they wait tables. It looked like the apartment of three 22 year old girls who had way too much money to spend on e-bay.

Right when we walked in we noticed that they are selling slices for $3.50 each. With beer at $4.50 a draft and hot chicks with straight-out-of-the-brewery-district dudes at every table we didn't feel welcomed. Everything seemed so forced. First an overpriced and ironic hot-dog shop and now they try to take away pizza?
The Pie:
Crust- The only truly weak link in the pie. It was pretty thin for a hand tossed pie, but lacked the crisp needed to either stand up to the toppings, or the texture for a really great NYC fold-up. We could tell they had something in mind with it, but it just didn't work.
Sauce- Fresh and zesty. Tart and tomato-y. Good.
Cheese- Abundant and real. I think this was the highlight of the pizza.
Peps- Pretty good. Some folded, most not. Good spice, but not overbearing.
Overall: The pie was decent, but the environment was custom made for young junior executives to feel perfectly safe, yet artsy in their new cool neighborhood. To make matters worse, we just kept thinking about how we cold be at Hounddog's drinking a pitcher of Bud and eating better pizza for only 10 bucks. Sure we would have to listen to Fugazi again, but the music here wasn't much better. Hounddogs has half the irony for a quarter of the price. Throw in a few pool tables and a dart board and it seems like a no-brainer. If we lived in this hood we'd be creaming our skinny jeans over this place because Old Town East sucks, but we don't so I have no intentions of ever returning to this place again. Josie's is just as far, and Yellow Brick Pizza is no Josie's. 3/5. Should have listened to my old man...

Due Sardi: Due Sardi

You know how sometimes bands release a song with the same name as the band, like "One Night Only" by One Night Only* or "Love City Groove" by Love City Groove? That's basically what Due Sardi have done, but with a pizza. I imagine that happens when a band is so thrilled with the name they've come up with they want to stick it to as much stuff as they can. Sort of like how George Foreman thinks 'George Foreman' is such a shit-hot name he wants to give it to as much stuff as possible. Like all six of his sons or his most favoured child, his grill.

Due Sardi is a Sicilian establishment down the bottom of Kinglsand Road next to Jaguar Shoes and Catch. This is the first pizza I've had for a while that tasted like it was made by a real-life, honest-to-the-Catholic-god Italian from Italy. I don't know if the guy who cooked this was actually Italian, but if not they certainly do a good impression of one. Much better than mine, but then all I really have as influences are the chef from the Simpsons and Mario, so it's not my fault my Italian accent is borderline racist.

It had pepperoni, red onion and pecorino cheese on. Although, as you can see in the photo, the pizza base was kind of wonky and the onion distribution was a little haphazard I feel these imperfections added to the authenticity. I could imagine this pizza being made in the hills of Sicily in some old, stone shed containing a woodfired pizza oven, surrounded by olive trees that rustle in the warm Mediterranean breeze and a bunch of old dudes with moustaches sitting around eating bruschetta and chuckling about how awful daughters are. If that's the case and my taste buds have nailed it I should also commend the delivery guy for how quickly he must have bombed it through Europe on his little moped. Sicily to Dalston usually takes more than twenty minutes.

9 out of 10

*I've just remembered the song is called 'Just For Tonight', not 'One Night Only'. Although they're different words they mean more or less the exact same thing so my point still stands, as does my laziness because I can't be bothered to think of another example to replace it with.

Simultaneously posted on CuiZine