First Impressions: New Recipe Domino’s Pizza
January 03, 2010 By: Ryan Category:
First Impressions,
Pizza,
Reviews
So I finally got around to trying the new recipe pizza over at Domino’s. I took advantage of the
2-medium 2-topping for $5.99 each deal and decided to celebrate the final Sunday of regular season football. Now that the fantasy football season is over, I can now spend a Sunday not worrying about how my team is doing and just sit back, relax and enjoy. Around where I live, there are plenty of non-major-chain pizza places to choose from. It’s extremely tempting to go with
my favorite pizza at my favorite place, but it’s my duty for
GrubGrade to find out what’s available to the masses. So with this in mind I invited my brother over for some new Domino’s pizza and a Sunday of football.
Our two chosen pizzas were
Pepperoni/Black Olives and
Ham/Pineapple. Now before we get the rounds of boo’s on topping choices, just keep in mind that the real taste test here involves Domino’s “new recipe” which involves
cheese, sauce and crust. As far as I know, there hasn’t been an upgrade of quality of toppings. This seems a little odd to me. You are trying to reinvent your company and pizza taste and your toppings stay just the same as always? This was on my mind before I took a bite so let’s see how the grubbing experience actually turned out. The cheese, sauce and crust are front and center and ready to be judged.
Cheese:
- The Upgrade: Shredded 100% real mozzarella and flavored with a hint of provolone
- My Thoughts: Flavor-wise, I didn’t get a hint of any change. The thickness of the cheese seems to be upped somewhat but that’s about where any changes end. Provolone is such a mild tasting cheese that I’m not really surprised about not picking up on it. The other flavors (especially the crust) dominated each slice so the cheese upgrade was lost.
The Cheese...
Sauce:
- The Upgrade: Sweeter and bolder with herbs and red pepper
- My Thoughts: I didn’t notice the sauce having any “sweeter” qualities. I consider a sweeter pizza sauce something found in a Ledo pizza…and the Domino’s version lacked any sweetness. I did, however, notice a more robust flavor from the sauce which stood out more than the old Domino’s. Bolder is an acceptable term for this sauce versus the old sauce. I think this “bolder” sauce actually takes the sauce to the opposite of sweet. In the end though, nothing too groundbreaking but a noticeable improvement.
The Sauce...
The Crust:
- The Upgrade: A garlic seasoned crust with parsley baked in
- My Thoughts: I ordered the pizza with the hand-tossed crust. No I don’t think it “tastes like cardboard”. Honestly, I never really had that impression with the old recipe. The crust seemed a tad thicker and greasier than what I’m used to from the old version. The most overwhelming quality I noticed was how garlicky the crust was. You can smell the garlic when you open the pizza box. It really took over the entire pizza with a garlic butter quality. The crust seemed identical to the Domino’s breadsticks which are “Baked to a golden brown and sprinkled with a flavorful blend of garlic, Romano cheese and parsley.” There was too much garlic and parmesan seasoning which you will notice coating your fingers when you touch it.
The Crust...
So overall, I’ve got to say the new pizza recipe at Domino’s worked out just OK. It’s a slight improvement from the old but I don’t see it changing my opinion in the BIG 3. I put Papa John’s #1, Domino’s #2 and Pizza Hut #3 before this taste-test and it remains the same now. Keep in mind this is just my personal preference of the major chains. It’s good to see Domino’s making the effort to improve their quality some but I wasn’t blown away. Maybe going all the way and upgrading the toppings (as I mentioned before) would change my mind. One thing is for sure though, garlic dominates this pizza.
If you’ve tried the new Domino’s pizza recipe, what do you think?
