Posts Tagged ‘pizza’

New items at KFC, Pizza Hut

Sunday, May 5th, 2013

DSC00389KFC is reportedly spending $50 million to market its new original recipe boneless chicken (a 10-piece mixed bucket is $14.99). I admit, I do like the commercials that show people thinking that they’ve accidentally eaten the bones.

The boneless chicken comes in both white and dark meat. After eating a piece of each kind, I concluded that the chicken is good but not great. Despite the so-called original recipe flavoring, it’s much different than eating a regular piece of original recipe chicken. The skin is too thin and you really lose that fried-chicken goodness.

Put another way, if I wanted to eat chicken tenders–which is pretty much what the boneless are like–then I’d order chicken tenders. It doesn’t help that KFC asks you what kind of dipping sauce you want for your boneless chicken.

***

2013-04-20 17.09.37Pizza Hut loves experimenting with crusts. First we saw the Stuffed Crust Pizza, then the Cheesy Bites Pizza, then the Double Deep Pizza (remember the rolled-over crust?) and now the Crazy Cheesy Crust Pizza ($12.99 for a single topping). It’s like the Cheesy Bites version in that you’re supposed to pull off the crust to eat separately, but the cheese is not rolled up in the dough this time.

Out of the aforementioned kinds, this was my favorite. The circular crusts hold a cheese-blend made up of provolone, asiago, mozzarella, fontina and mild white cheddar. It’s got so much flavor that I wish the rest of the pizza had the same blend. I would probably order this again.

The new pizza was launched in early April and will stick around for up to three months.

Salvatore’s Tomato Pies

Saturday, April 28th, 2012

Sun Prairie has another dining hit on its hands with Salvatore’s Tomato Pies. It’s a wonderful contrast of simple and complicated (in a good way): the whole menu is almost entirely pizza and only in one size (16″); however, each type of pizza is a masterpiece.

Take, for example, The Fat Uncle Tony ($18.99). It’s topped with smoky premium bacon, homemade sausage and spicy pepperoni. You can really tell the quality of the meat used is high, and it just may be my new favorite pizza–I mean, pie–in town.

Salvatore’s also has weekend specials, and one particular week I got to try the Thai curry pie ($22.50; it’s now on the regular menu as One Night in Bangkok). I enjoyed the ensemble of flavors, from the chicken to the mushrooms to the red onion and more. Helpful hint: order early, since the specials are likely to sell out quickly.

Next on my to-eat list is the plain Tomato Pie (mozzarella, provolone and basil for $14.79), to which I’ll add some prosciutto ($3). I hope they bring back the Duck Goat Pizza, which was a one-time special I heard about after the fact.

You can dine in, as there are some tables inside, but I’d call ahead for carryout. Salvatore’s is open from 4:30-10 p.m. Tuesday-Sunday. According to its website, Salvatore’s hopes to be “open for lunch soon.”

Salvatore's Tomato Pies on Urbanspoon

Has Domino’s improved?

Sunday, February 26th, 2012

Nearly two years ago, Domino’s admitted its customers were right when they said that the crust tasted like cardboard and the sauce tasted like ketchup. It was a bold move to admit these flaws, but the company’s ad agency pushed them into this bare-all campaign.

I actually hadn’t eaten Domino’s since 2008 or 2009, and this campaign didn’t tempt me at all. However, I ended the hold-out last week to not only try the reformulated pizza but also the supposedly improved cheese bread.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, well … shame on me. In a nutshell, the pizza was still forgettable, and the cheese bread actually was worse than before.

Besides the lack of flavor, I mainly didn’t like the pizza because the cheese had re-solidified, so I was essentially eating lukewarm pizza. It didn’t help that I knew it was going to be lukewarm: Domino’s online delivery system told me the pizza was “checked for perfection” at 4:34 p.m. but not out for delivery until 4:58 p.m., meaning it sat for 24 min. in the store. Even if that’s a normal amount of time, a customer shouldn’t know that their order is just sitting there.

The cheese bread, which is also now stuffed with cheese, lost the garlic-y and greasy-in-a-good-way flavor of its previous incarnation. Plus, the two ends pieces had almost no cheese on it, which meant I got to experience the flavorless bread. Very, very disappointing.

The only thing I enjoyed was the online delivery system. I’ve previously noted that Toppers Pizza has the worst online delivery system–the site frequently stalls, which means you have to reload the page and start over. Meanwhile, Pizza Hut and Papa John’s have no-frills-but-functional systems.

Domino’s uses one of six different themes (e.g. nerdy professor, romantic, etc.) to illustrate your pizza being made. First it told me the time my order was taken, who was preparing it and then when it went in the oven. You can leave a note of encouragement during this process, such as “You’re my favorite Domino’s Team Members.”

Finally, as mentioned, it tells you the time the pizza was checked and then out for delivery. Once the other pizza chains copy this online delivery feature, Domino’s will have absolutely nothing over them.

    Urban Air TryaTaste

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