Tag: California Pizza Kitchen

Surprisingly good

California Pizza Kitchen is both a pizzeria chain and a brand of premium frozen pizzas. They were famous back in the 90’s because of their unusual toppings, which has become far more common in the decades since. Their frozen offerings have changed over the decades, and lately they seem to specialize on thin crust pizzas. I prefer thick crust myself, but I decided to gave these a try last time they were on sale at Safeway ($5 each from $10 regular price – $8 at cheaper stores).

I was actually quite surprised with how much I liked the pizzas. They don’t tste like frozen pizzas at all. While the “crispy thin” crust was, indeed, crispy if cooked for the full time, it had a nice, chewy texture if lightly undercooked. It held the toppings well, without much spillage, and because it was so thin, it didn’t compete with the toppings. And the toppings were very good.

Each pizza realistically serves 2 people when accompanied by a salad (or if they aren’t too hungry).

Unfortunately, California Pizza Kitchen is manufactured by Nestlé – a company that I try to avoid whenever possible because it’s evil. Doubly unfortunately, I often forget what items are made by Nestlé and buy them anyway – this was the case here.

The Sicilian Recipe pizza has Italian sausage, spicy ham, Genoa salami, sweet basil, Mozzarella and Fontina cheeses and a spicy marinara sauce. It definitely had a kick – enough that it woke me up but didn’t turn me away from eating it. I can handle a little bit of spice, but I’m someone who orders her food “mild” at a restaurant.

The toppings are well balanced, complementing each other without interfering. It’s clear someone worked to make sure they all worked together in the right proportions. The sauce had a slight sweetness to it that worked very well to counter the spiciness – again, thought went into this. What the toppings lacked, however, was an element of crunch. This might be provided by the crispy crust – but I purposely undercooked it. I would have liked some added onions or peppers.

I liked the Margherita pizza even better. It has Roma tomatoes, Mozzarella and Fontina cheeses, olive oil and basil, and comes with an Italian herb sauce. The toppings were tasty and extremely well balanced. The sauce succeeded in not being too sweet, being subtle and not competing with the tomatoes while still providing some needed acidity. The tomatoes were bright and fresh tasting and the basil pesto was very tasty and used sparingly, which made it a welcome surprise when you took a bite with it. In all, I enjoyed this pizza very much.