New Grandiosa Taste Test: – This was not supposed to be allowed

It's almost time for the first big launch window of the year in grocery stores, and several manufacturers have given us a little taste of what we can look forward to.

The February release, officially released in week 8, is the largest, and more than a thousand new grocery products will hit stores in the coming weeks. One of the most exciting things to do is a Grandiosa like you've never seen before: Hjertepizza.

The new product appears to be exactly the same as the original, except for the looks – and at a somewhat higher price, initial indications are to be believed.

Maybe it's still worth it, according to Italian Alan Rodriguez, com.pizzaiolo In Winther by Frognerparken. It's worth noting if choosing between a regular Grandiosa and a Hjertepizza Grandiosa, and if you like Grandiosa.

Since naming this pizza is a bit painful, we have to believe the pizza chef.

– This wasn't supposed to be allowed.

Taste the difference

The heart pizza is made at the Grandiosa factory in Stranda, and should taste the same as the original, with a few minor changes: it has one percent less cheese (possibly because there is a slightly larger crust in the heart formations) and it contains salted wheat flour.

Malted wheat flour is often used in a pre-dough called BigaThis is a common technique in Italian yeast dough, which should give a more airy dough.

Another thing we can read from the ingredients list is the salt and sugar content. In the Heart Pizza, sugar is listed before salt on the ingredients list, where the original has the opposite, but a little deeper dive into the nutritional content shows that the original is cut sweeter: a regular Grandiosa pizza has 2.8 grams of sugars and 0.9 grams. of salt, while the heart pizza contains 2 grams of sugar and 1.1 grams of salt.

The heart pizza is also somewhat smaller, weighing 485 grams, while the original pizza weighs 575 grams. On the packaging, it is stated that a serving is 300 grams.

There's still a lot we can read on the packaging, so we put it to the test.

We received help for the test from Italian Alan Rodriguez, pizzaiolo at Winther Artisan Food & Restaurant in Frognerparken in Oslo.

-Pizza is my great passion! I come from Naples, and we take pizza very seriously,” Rodriguez tells DinSide.

-We grow up with some ideas about what pizza should be, and frozen pizza is not part of that.

He talks about Italy's large pizza section, which extends almost around Rome. From the Italian capital southward, the proud pizza tradition applies, and you'll have to look hard to find frozen pizza there.

– In northern Rome and northern Europe, pizza culture is “something different,” says the pizzaiolo.

Having lived in Norway for about ten years, he has nonetheless tasted a few versions, so he's not a complete stranger to Norwegian frozen pizza culture.

This is how we tested it

• We tested the new Grandiosa Heart Pizza against the original Grandiosa Heart Pizza.
• We had help with the testing from pizza chef Alan Rodriguez from Winther in Frognerparken, who also prepared the pizzas.
• Pizza is evaluated according to appearance, smell, texture and taste – it is evaluated as frozen pizza.
• Since this is a new product, and looks distinctly different from the others, the testing was not conducted as a blind test.
• The pizza was tested in Oslo, on February 1, 2024.

beautiful things

The two pizzas stand out clearly in appearance: one is classically round, the other is made of hearts, and looks almost like a waffle (From the test winner WELVA Which works somewhat unconventionally with six cores).

They both may have had a bit of a reckless transfer, although we made an effort to transfer them flat, and followed the manufacturer's advice to distribute the filling evenly before frying.

In the original version, the filling was already well out at the edges, so there's almost no crust here, while the Heart Pizza has a nice, crunchy crust. The bottom of the novelty is also much more ventilated.

The main impression of the taste is quite similar: this is sweet.

“It's a mystery to me that pizza is so sweet!” says Rodriguez.

It also doesn't help with the sweet paprika bits on top.

If we ignore the shape, it is the bottom that makes the biggest difference. Both have a soft, airy and somewhat sweet base, but the base of the new version has been given more color, which is a positive, according to Rodriguez.

-I'm always a little skeptical when I see that the bottom is completely white on the bottom, as that's a sign that the bottom hasn't risen enough. If I saw a white bottom pizza in Italy, I would bring it back.

Heart pizza has got more colors under it, but there's still a long way to go. It still picks up the texture well, with a really good, crunchy crust.

-Personally, I think pizza should have that delicious, very soft and airy edge, but that kind of industrial pizza is hard to achieve. But what that crust does is make the texture and experience more exciting.

Although the main impression when we taste pizza is that it is very sweet, it also performs the art of being very salty. It makes working with dough much easier, but it doesn't make the experience fun.

And while we're talking comfort: while the new bottom is more ventilated and looks like it could have been raised a bit more, it still has a long way to go.

– This pizza looks like it will give you a real stomach ache if you eat it all.

The pizza chef is still in doubt when we ask which one he prefers.

– I'm from Naples, we don't buy frozen pizza, there's nothing here that suggests I will buy it! But I should food One of them again, I would choose Hjertepizza.

The original was a roll of four dice, and the new version is much better, so here it is a roll of five.

Heart Pizza will be launched next week. Perfect timing for those who think grandiosa is an appropriate Valentine's Day food.