10

As a college student, I eat a lot of frozen pizza. Unfortunately, the brand of frozen pizza that I eat has very little taste.

Recently, I started adding Parmesan cheese, basil and garlic powered to the pizza before putting it in the toaster oven.

Can I do better than that? What can be done with frozen pizza to make it taste better?

Ami
  • 217
  • 1
  • 2
  • 4

11 Answers11

11

We have a pizza stone that makes the finished pizza taste so much better. In addition we add more toppings to the pizza. For instance sliced mushrooms, pineapple, olives, peppers and cheese. The sky is the limit. And this way you can have a 5 topping pizza for the price of the toppings and a cheap frozen pizza.

For the pizza stone you don't want it to make a drastic change in temperature otherwise the stone would break. So for the oven I put the stone in the oven then preheat it. So the stone heats up with the oven. During this time I prepare the toppings. When the oven is hot enough you take out the stone, careful it is hot, put the pizza on, throw the toppings on then put back in oven and cook.

Kyra
  • 4,606
  • 20
  • 50
  • 74
  • Is a toaster oven apt for heating a pizza stone? (sorry, no experiences with t.o. here) How long does it take to get enough temp? – Dr. belisarius Nov 24 '10 at 15:11
  • I don't think so. At least the one I have would be too large. – Kyra Nov 24 '10 at 15:29
  • 1
    @belisarius - you can buy stones sized for toaster ovens and large toaster ovens that can fit regular stones. – justkt Nov 24 '10 at 15:39
  • 5
    For a dirt cheap "pizza stone" (college student budget I assume) go to a home improvement store and buy a ceramic (not porcelain) tile. Should cost about two bucks and works quite well, used mine for years. – Bill Nov 24 '10 at 19:12
  • 1
    If you have no space for a stone, get a tray with holes in it - a crisper. "Soggy bottom" will go away with that. – Orbling Nov 25 '10 at 00:19
8

Domenico DeMarco might be the best pizzaiolo alive: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAolCtDMTu4

Just watching that my pizzas improved considerably: parmesan, fresh basil and extra virgin olive oil after baking the pizza. He puts some oil before baking and I think it's a good thing, but most people disagree on that.

Frozen pizzas have two problems:

  • Bad crust You can improve it baking in a pizza stone or, if that's not an option, putting some olive oil in the tray you put the pizza.
  • Bad ingredients It's always a matter of taste, I suggest keeping it simple. Mozzarella and any other cheese that melts should help.

By the way, making pizza at home, from scratch, couldn't be cheaper. Believe it or not, you're overpaying for the frozen stuff.

Also, you are grating your parmesan, right?

Ray
  • 6,154
  • 13
  • 50
  • 86
Julio
  • 2,021
  • 5
  • 24
  • 31
  • 2
    +1 for making the pizza yourself. If you're using a pizza stone and adding a bunch of ingredients, you're halfway to making it anyway - and pre-mixed, unbaked pizza dough is available in stores, that's really the only part I wouldn't want to hand-make. – Cyclops Nov 24 '10 at 21:41
  • @Cyclops - you're right, but it takes space to roll out even pre-made dough, and it makes a bit of a mess. (I use the dining-room table.) Some stores do sell pre-rolled pizza dough, but I can't vouch for its quality. – Goodbye Stack Exchange Nov 26 '10 at 01:44
  • 2
    If you have limited kitchen space, buying a pre-made crust is a good option. It's what I used to do in university since it takes much less time/effort than dealing with dough and still ends up much nicer than frozen pizza. – Allison Jan 29 '11 at 09:01
6

If you're a person who likes spicy as a compensation for other flavor deficiencies - try adding red pepper and/or Tabasco. My favorite is actually Tony's Creole seasoning. The stone idea sounds like it would help a lot for texture, too :)

zanlok
  • 1,723
  • 2
  • 20
  • 26
4

I'm sorry, but I honestly don't think there's anything that can make frozen pizza better. All you can accomplish by adding fresh ingredients is to make THEM taste worse. That's not a way to have a meal.

Instead of eating frozen pizza, order pizza if you don't have time to prepare your own.

And pizza is really easy to prepare - if you're adding all those ingredients to frozen pizza you're already half way there. You don't even need to make your own dough, you can usually buy it in the local bakery and then either freeze it or keep in a fridge for a day or two.

Please don't eat frozen pizza. Every time you eat a frozen pizza, an Italian fairy dies. :(

Domchi
  • 246
  • 1
  • 3
  • I would put it less dramatic, but: this! If you have to buy fresh toppings anyway, and have a freezer at hand, you can make your own pizza! If you have the freezer-space, you can even take the dough, take about half an hour to an hour at some point, and prepare the basics: roll the dough to the proper size, add pizza sauce and a base layer of cheese. Put wax-paper between the pizza-slices, wrap up in cling wrap, and freeze the stack. Works great for me! – Layna Oct 06 '15 at 06:41
4

While not relating to taste directly, I find cooking the pizza directly on the rack instead of in a pan makes it quite crispy and I enjoy that texture more than the soft dough texture you'll get from cooking it in a pan. You may want to place the pan you would have used on the lower rack to catch any cheese or crumbs that might fall.

Other than that I've usually used various spices to kick up the flavor (garlic powder, crushed red peppers, etc).

Ryan Elkins
  • 6,203
  • 19
  • 50
  • 65
2

Add some fresh ingredients:

  • basil and/or oregano
  • chopped up ripe tomato
  • fresh garlic
  • sundried tomoato

You'll find after dressing up a pizza, you can just start making your own from scratch.

Bruce Alderson
  • 2,775
  • 19
  • 25
1

add extra ingredients and another layer of sauce and cheese. You can make the sauce by taking a can of tomato sauce (not a jar of spaghetti sauce) and add Italian seasoning to it.

Anonymous
  • 11
  • 1
1

I will swear blind that the only thing it really needs is olive-oil. A light drizzle of olive oil.

Ian Webster
  • 21
  • 1
1

I just got /ate a walmart pizza as featured in their "deli" section. The directions said to put it directly on the oven grate but I ignored that as I tried it before and it drooped and melted between the wire rack .. what I did was added a slew of ingredients and boosted the temp from a terrible 35o to a better 450 Also i use a pan nut put a grate under it with small spaces and sprayed the underside with olive oil spray .. It was the best store bought crust I ever tried .. I cooked it the same time they suggested about 16 minutes .. bear in mind this was not a frozen pizza

Ellis
  • 11
  • 1
  • This was flagged as not an answer. I think it's probably fine, though borderline - yes, this wasn't a frozen pizza, but the same things might well work on both, so it's worth keeping. – Cascabel Oct 05 '15 at 16:29
0

In my family, we add more ingredients to improve frozen pizza. Also, I lower the heat.

I always "build up" the pizza by starting with the spices and olive oil (the spray will work as well). We use mainly: tumeric,cumin,cinnamon and sage, Italian spices are good too. Add a dash of curry if you like it spicier. Don't over spice it, rather drizzle olive oil. Crush the spices in your palm to help bring out their flavor.

Thinly sliced onions go next. My personal favorite is to tear up some deli honey ham,then lightly whisk an egg and drizzle. This helps the cooking process and gives an almost quiche taste. Then we use deli cheese. Tear or crumble the cheeses so they're even,then top with chives and sliced tomatoes. I give a quick dust of butter or olive oil spray to crisp the cheese.

rumtscho
  • 138,730
  • 45
  • 311
  • 565
user67043
  • 19
  • Please don't add "thank you" as an answer. Once you have sufficient reputation, you will be able to vote up questions and answers that you found helpful. - From Review – dlb May 10 '18 at 13:37
  • @dlb How is this a "thank you" answer? I mean, sure, the last couple of sentences thank the other answerers for their contributions and you could edit those out if you really object to them. But the post as a whole is 90% answer to the question and gives a huge number of suggestions. Don't vote to delete an answer that contains actual information and which can easily be edited to remove the content you object to. – David Richerby May 10 '18 at 17:35
  • I edited this to be more readable and to remove the health advice, which is off topic here. As it stands, it is mostly OK as an answer. The remaining problems are inherent in the question itself - it is easy to interpret it as an invitation for recipes, or "which toppings to add", and this interpretation makes it too broad. – rumtscho May 10 '18 at 19:20
  • @DavidRicherby I think it has been stated repeatedly that comments need not be justified. As stated, the main issue is with the question itself, but I do not agree with voting to close 7+ year old questions that have been allowed to stay for that long. There were multiple things with the answer as shown by rumtscho's edits and we learn what is on topic and useful by comments and edits. I chose one of the standard options, could have chosen another or taken the time to rewrite 2/3 and was done. I appreciate those effort, I just chose not to and did not tell someone else to. – dlb May 10 '18 at 21:12
  • @dlb Sorry but if you're going to say "I'm voting to delete this because it's just a thank you", when the post blatantly isn't just a thank you, you should expect people to take issue with that. You objected to the "thank you" at the end; it would have taken seconds to delete that. If you wanted to object to other content, you should have also written a custom comment to point out what the problem is, instead of objecting on nonsensical grounds that leave the poster no clue about how to fix the problem themself. – David Richerby May 11 '18 at 10:12
-3

shaved truffles

David LeBauer
  • 1,101
  • 3
  • 15
  • 27
  • 1
    I'm sure you're kidding, but... yeah, no. Truffles won't fix frozen pizza unless you have access to a supplier who brought them over in the last week or two, while they are still fresh. – BobMcGee Aug 01 '11 at 03:39