Wow, here comes a new FPR just in time for everyone to read by themselves or at least 6 feet away from anyone else.
This review comes with a big caveat, so big that i added an asterisk to the review name. At first I wasn’t even going to mention it, but I realized I have to be open and honest with you all. You’ve trusted me to give you the pizza facts, so here it is: this pizza has been in my freezer for like a year. I’ve been meaning to review it, but I just never quite felt like I was ready for Oprah’s take on an FP. Pandemics change people. I’m ready now.
So, the pizza i review here likely isn’t completely representative of Oprah, O That’s Good, or Kraft Heinz’s hard work they put into this product. There’s definitely aspects of the pie I ate that were negatively impacted by the long freeze time, but there’s also some characteristics that i believe are immutable. I’ll focus on the latter, but will speculate a bit about the former.
O That’s Good has two types of pizza – thin crust (square shaped. weird for an FP), and classic crust. I got a classic crust pie. According to their website the thin crust is “33% cauliflower, 100% delicious!”, and the classic crust is “1/3 cauliflower and fully delicious.” Sounds pretty similar.
O That’s Good also has a line of pasta, soups and sides. Who cares.
I don’t remember how much i paid for this pizza on account of it being so long ago, but It’s going for $5.99 at Target online so I’ll use that (assuming they aren’t following John Menard’s business practices in these trying times).
- suggested cook time 24-28 minutes at 400 (one of the longest cook times I’ve ever seen)
- $5.99?
- 24.1 ounces
- 1600 Cal/FP
- ehh ok: 267 Cal/$, 4.0 oz/$
FP review:
Appearance:
The packaging reminds me of DiGiorno a bit. Overall not a huge fan. Maybe it’s the weird purple table cloth the pizza is sitting on, or the emblem that says “so delicious you won’t taste the difference!” (what difference?), but the FPP just is not doing it for me:
One thing i did appreciate is they included baking instructions for people living at a high altitude. I also really liked that these instructions weren’t too prescriptive. Oprah understands that if you’re cooking one of these in the mountains, you don’t need a box to tell you how to live your life.
I did not take a picture of the pizza before it went in the oven because it looked terrible.
Here’s how it looked after 27 minutes:
All things considered, i was pretty happy with how it turned out. Sure it cooked a little unevenly, but the cheese mostly browned nicely, and the toppings looked sort of inviting. Like they’d let you come over if you had nowhere else to go. I mean not right now, you should stay home, don’t go to anyone’s house.
Nose:
Not good at all. Smells like freezer? Muted notes of cauliflower and wet cardboard. Kind of reminiscent of how an uncooked lean pocket smells, which reminds me of my childhood.
Mouth-feel:
Honestly, probably one of the worst frozen pizzas I’ve ever had in this regard, and i’m not sure how much of this was my fault. Here’s some quotes from some reviews of this pie on Target.
O That’s Bad Pizza said: “I had to get the sharpest butcher knife to cut the thing when I took it out of the oven. The crust is thick, dense, tasteless.”
That’s Bad ! said: “…then there was the crust, the most important part of a great pizza. I believe cardboard would have tasted better. ”
Disgusted said: “The crust is like cardboard and the whole thing lacks any flavor. I’m blown away that Oprah would back such a terrible product.”
I say: “Yeah, it’s pretty bad. The crust was very very hard and way too thick to be classified as crispy. If you’re going to make a hard crust it can’t be 12 milimeters thick:
There was also barely any sauce. If there originally was more sauce and it somehow seeped into the crust or whatever while it was in the freezer over the past year that makes the crust mistake even worse. If this chunky, cardboardy, hard, barnyard crust is sauce-seeped crust, i don’t even want to think about how inedible the unseeped crust is.
On other hand, If this sauceless pie is how “Oprah” intended it to be….. I’d bet it was her clone’s idea.”
Overall:
With all the negatives I’ve listed above, I will give a bit of praise here. Most of the toppings were much better than I expected them to be, especially considering their long hibernation. The pepperoni was clearly a better product than what’s usually used on FPs and the sausage had a great spicy zest. The green and red peppers were soggy like most vegetables inevitably become on a frozen pizza, but the olives somehow avoided this fate and had a nice texture and taste.
In summary this pie had many problems, some of them might have been a result of my negligence, but at its core it was just trying too hard. Here’s a good example from the frozen pizza packaging:
O That’s Good is trying to be hip and cool by telling consumers everything they can recycle. First of all, when in doubt don’t recycle (just read the link, but basically if you put stuff in the recycling that can’t be recycled it wrecks everything, so don’t. But also idk most stuff probably isn’t really getting recycled anyway, but try your best). Second of all, calling the pizza cardboard a paper circle is weird. Third of all, the purple table cloth background is still dumb.
Ratings:
Value: 68/100 – I guess it’s pretty dense, and it has a fair amount of calories, so it does fill you up
Taste: 63/100 – mostly bland, the proteins tasted above average, the olives were nice, the sauce and crust was awful, the cheese was kind of just there.
Aura: 22/100 – would’ve given it a 12 if it didn’t have the high altitude instructions
Mouth-feel: 8/100 – Basically the worst. Added a few points for the olives intact structural integrity.
Overall: 40/100 – F, better than the Roma Bacon Cheeseburger, but not by much
Suggested wine paring – I don’t drink alcohol during the pandemic because Joe Rogan said it hurts my immune system and i need all that for this stuff. I’ve been weening myself off seltzer water so it’s mostly been tap water with a bit of lime juice. Idk try it.
If I go to the store anytime soon maybe i’ll pickup another FP and do another one of these. For now I’ll be staying put, but who could say?
frozenpizzareviews 