Food Review: Vegan frozen pizza options

So today, for my first food review, I would like to talk a bit about vegan pizza. As one of the foods I miss most since my cheese consuming days, I have long looked for a suitable substitute for this staple of the typical American teen's diet. However, there are a few options to consider with vegan pizza. 1) make your own. If you can stand the funky flavors and weird textures of the available products out there, that is probably your best bet. You can also make your own cheese, but so far, I have found that mine is only palatable as a cheese alternative in macaroni and cheese. But I will save that for another post. 2) You can buy a frozen vegan pizza. Easier said than done. My rating scale for these are on a few different things. Cheese taste, overall texture of the pizza, crust, and overall taste. 1 is Inedible, 5 is Outstanding.

For those of you in the Knoxville area, Kroger, Earthfare, and most other health food stores carry Amy's pizza varieties. Your non-dairy options are cheese, or spinach pizzas. Both are gluten free and so, are made with rice crust. The cheese taste on these pizzas is about a 3. It is not terribly, but it leaves a lot to be desired with regard to typical cheese flavor. It is relatively bland. The overall texture of the pizza is a 3.5. The rice crust is super crispy and crunches very nicely when you bite into it. It does however, have a tendancy to fall apart. Overall taste on this pizza is a 3.25. It is somewhat bland as previously mentioned, and could use some more sauce. The sauce itself is good, slightly tangy in flavor, but it needs more of it as the pizza as a whole is pretty dry.

The other frozen non-dairy pizza I am aware of, available in this area is Tofutti Pizza Pizzaz. I found this brand at Go Nutrition, and thus far, nowhere else. I will keep looking however. The only flavor I have found so far is cheese. For this pizza, I would rate the cheese a 3.5. It proved somewhat creamy, with a parmesan type flavor. Not at all yeasty. I would still like to see a melty, gooey cheese in a vegan pizza, but so far, this is one of the best I have had. The crust is a pan crust that is chewy in the middle, and crispy on the edges, which is how I like it. No complaints on the crust, I give it a 4.5. It held together pretty well although with veggies, I don't know. This pizza overall rates about a 4. It had enough sauce and the cheese was creamy enough to keep the pizza from drying out. The flavor was good. The only major drawback to this pizza is the fat and calories. For roughly a 3" by 5" slice (it comes with 3), you are out 175 calories and 5 grams of fat (2 of which are saturated). This is not as bad as regular dairy pizza, but is somthing to keep an eye on since, if you eat all 3 pieces, you have just consumed 525 calories and 15 grams of fat in pizza alone. However, it is definately worth it for the occasional splurge. Bon appetite!