I grew up in NY/NJ (and I am of Italian descent) so I guess I am a pizza snob.
Pizza Hut suffers from 2 problems, the sauce is not very good and the crust is not great. However, when I was living in San Diego, given my choices, I was okay with Pizza Hut. Not up to my standards, but adequate, would be the way I describe it. Little Caesar and Dominos are worse.
Jim
I can’t go that far, but I’m afraid I have developed a snobbery (at least the way it is defined in this thread) over pizza over time— I now find pretty much all delivery chain pizza (PH, Domino’s, Papa John’s, etc.) inedible. It comes in part from having worked for pizza places, including the one praised by the OP, for a number of years.
Even among the dreaded national chains, I think there’s been a gradual decline in quality linked to more automation and pre-prepared ingredients. When I started at Pizza Hut ages ago, we still did a number of things by hand (slicing onions and peppers, blending flour with yeast and oil to make dough) that they abandoned in favor of prepackaged/premixed stuff. I remember liking Papa John’s crust a lot when it first came out, but the last couple of pizzas I ordered from them had crust with the texture (and some of the flavor, I suspect) of particle board.
We aren’t overrun with choices where I live, but even the chain restaurant Mellow Mushroom makes pizza so vastly superior to the delivery chains that I’d rather go pick one up, or just go without, than pay to have a disappointing, processed plank of dough topped oversalted/flavorless toppings brought to my home.
Then again, I don’t smoke much pot anymore…
I developed my “Pizza Hut theory” when I was about 14, and the responses to this thread seem to confirm it.
Basically, it is that Pizza Hut pizza is “consistently mediocre”. You are never going to have a great pizza there, but you can also count on it not being terrible.
I find there is a lot of money to be made in the USA by being consistently mediocre.
I worked at both Papa John’s and Domino’s. They’re both pretty gross, although Domino’s probably has its own little corner in hell next to radio DJs and mimes for the garbage they pass off as pizza. Here’s a hint, fellas: average cost of a cheese pizza was somewhere in the neighborhood of $.80. We sold them for $8 (this is in the last year). Papa Johns’ crust is gross, but the rest of it is decent.
I actually like Pizza Hut and Little Caesar just fine for cheap pizza, although I still prefer the smaller places around here like Mellow Mushroom and this local place that makes their bred fresh every day.
If the alternative is an english muffin with tomato paste and american cheese on it, PH looks good! I can’t stand the chains-they use the cheapest ingredients they can (artificial cheese). When the stuff melts, it leaves a layer of grease all over the top. You can make excellent pizza-just use good quality flour, tomato sauce, and cheese. but if your BOM (for a large pie) can cost no more than 25 cents, what you get is awful.
Papa John’s sauce is too bland for me.
As a kid, one of our biggest (only?) treats was going to Pizza Hut and I guess because of that, I have always loved their pizza. Especially the thick pan crust which my mom always preferred. I hate dry flat crusts on pizza and I usually eat other pizzas and give the crusts to the dogs. Pizza Hut crust is one of the only ones I always eat, I just love the thick, chewy, bready, shiny, fatty crust! I also love their stuffed crust crusts! I will hang my head in shame now.
I’m no pizza snob, but their pizza makes me sick. There’s something gross about the way their cheese clumps up, versus the way real mozzarella stretches and melts. Plus the pizza is about as greasy as they come. Gut rot; the only place I think is greasier may be Papa John’s.
Streets of New York is a chain too I believe, but they have fantastic pizza. Pizza Hut would have good pizza if I had never seen or heard of pizza ever, maybe.
I like Pizza Hut pizza just fine! Every so often, I hit their lunch buffet—and I would go more than every so often except that I’m sure it wouldn’t be good for me: it’s definitely not health food. But as a place to fill up on a variety of pizza for six bucks, it makes me happy.
I like Pizza Hut too. It’s better than Godfathers. And it’s infinitely better than Dominos and Little Ceasers. Actually, a rotting wombat carcass is better than Little Ceasers, and only marginally worse than Dominos.
The best pizza I’ve ever had is from a place in town called “A Taste of the Big Apple”. I have no idea if their pizza is, in fact, anything like what they sell in the Big Apple, but it’s divine. Of course, the place is run by one old lady and her son, and it’s never #$^%ing open. (OK, so they’re open for about two hours a day, four on weekends or some such nonsense.)
As a wise man once said, “Pizza is like sex. When it’s good, it’s great. And when it’s bad…it’s still pretty good.”
I got no problem with Pizza Hut, and I order from them quite a bit. Domino’s, too. If I want the really good stuff, I’ll get One Guy From Italy (owned by, seriously, this one guy from Italy). But it’s all pretty good.
As for frozen, have y’all tried the Garlic Bread Pizza from DiGiorno’s? Those suckers are better than many pizzeria pizzas! Truly amazing, and one pizza is more than one person can eat.
My only complaint about their regular pizza is their pepperoni has some sort of off taste to it, I can’t put my finger on it.
But any sort of cheese-stuffed crust is awful, and PH is known for pushing it. Without variation the cheesy stuffing always tastes like salted plastic.
I actually like Pizza Hut when I’m not in the US. Foreign Pizza Hut is better than US Pizza Hut. Dominos, suprisingly, is about the same (maybe the foreign stuff is a bit better).
In general, though, I don’t like Pizza Hut. It makes me ill for some reason. I like store bought stuff better than that. If you want cheap pizza, it’s gotta be
Pizza Hut.
I agree with Lightray in that the idea of Pizza Hut is akin to McDonald’s for me.
When I want “a good burger” or “a good pizza” I don’t go to McDonald’s or Pizza Hut. However, there’s a lot of times when I specifically want McDonald’s hamburgers or Pizza Hut pizza and that’s when I choose those places. I like their specific style of food but I wouldn’t normally compare it to what I consider “good” for those types of foods.
I prefer Pizza Hut at the restaurant anymore. Their pizzas just taste different when served out of the big cast iron pan thing. I’m not too much a fan of their pizza elsewise…but I did eat it a lot as a kid before we got to be a Community Of Too Many Pizza Places.
I’m not exactly sure where you live but Rockin’ Tomato has great pizza as does Home Slice on south Congress.
To me, pizza is hand tossed and stretched by some old Italian guy and his son as they talk about the Yankee game and whether Vito is going to get in the union. It is called a “pie” and you order it as such. I don’t know what is in the cheese, sauce and dough that these chains pass off as pizza but i do know that I would rather have nothing than consume that garbage.
I have found two NY style private pizza shops in Orlando that are tolerable but my first snack every time I go back home is a slice and a coke.
My youngest daughter really likes PH, and is always a little ticked that we never order from there. For me, the crust is the main culprit. In my mind, no real pizza has a fat inner tube of crust around the outside. I mean, it isn’t what I would expect of a thin crust, but neither is it thick. Just a whole bunch of bland bread. Same thing with Donimos or DiGiorno’s frozen.
There are probably 20 pizza joints within 5 miles of my house. So when I know I really like some of them, there is simply no reason to order from PH. Of the 20 or so joints, I must acknowledge that there are more than a couple of independents who are every bit as bad as PH in their own special way.
Also, tho I’m not a fan when buying, PH is super in terms of supporting the community. More than once I have been associated with service projects for scouts and such, and PH has been very generous in providing pizzas for the workers either free or at really reduced cost.
Kraft does make aged cheddar. Don’t confuse Kraft Singles (which contain as little as 51% cheese) or Kraft Velveeta (which contains less than 51% cheese) with their other cheeses.
But do they make a good aged cheddar?
I would say, no.
My thoughts exactly (except with no quotes around “different”). Pizza snobs always sound so idiotic to me when they go on about a specific, regional type of pizza as if there’s some narrow continuum of pizza and they’ve discovered its apex - ironically making themselves sound sheltered and ignorant. There’s no “best pizza”, there are too many types of pizza for that to be so. Pizza Hut is fine - a nice firm layer of brown speckled cheese that’s not too gooey, huge chunks of fresh, vegetable toppings, and a thick, crispy, well oiled crust.
EDIT: Though I should disclaim that I wouldn’t touch any of their horrifying pizza “creations” with a 10-foot-pole…