Drive-thru gourmet: The ‘heroes in a half shell’ join forces with Pizza Hut
This week I reached out for a returning all-time fave, Cheesy Bites Pizza, plus four spinoffs inspired by, of all things, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, at America’s No. 1 home-delivery pizza twirler, Pizza Hut, with 6,300 restaurants ’round all 50 states.
You remember Cheesy Bites Pizza — the pie with 28 pull-apart puffs loaded with cheese circling the pie. As if the Hut was lacking for places to hide more cheese, now even stuffed crust isn’t the pole-sitter. Cheesy bites cuts the cheese into 28 sharable, tossable, cheese-loaded dough balls.
There are eight slices in a Pizza Hut pizza. I’m not a math whiz, but eight doesn’t go into 28 evenly. So my four slices have four cheesy bites, while you’re stuck with four slices with only three cheesy bites. When you get your own fast-food-review column, you’ll get the bigger half.
Here’s the Cheesy Bites Pizza breakdown: a large, one-topping, 14-inch pizza surrounded by 28 cheese puffs instead of traditional plain crust.
Total calories: 340 (for one slice of pepperoni Cheesy Bites Pizza). Fat grams: 16. Sodium: 890 mg. Carbs: 35 g. Dietary fiber: 2 g. Protein: 16 g. Manufacturer’s suggested retail price: $11.99.
Cheesy Bites Pizza was introduced in 2006 and still is one of Pizza Hut’s all-time best-selling limited-time-only specials. Paraphrasing H.L. Mencken, no pizza chain ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public’s … obsession with cheese.
This time Pizza Hut has tied in Cheesy Bites Pizza with the release of the new “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” movie. Pizza Hut must figure that the Turtles have greater credibility — they’re certainly better actors — than the Hut’s most recent celebrity endorser, hefty country crooner Blake Shelton. Who you gonna believe, four cartoon turtles trained in the martial arts, or a country star who appears on a game show?
This time, to honor its hard-shell spokes-turtles, Pizza Hut has created four spinoff pizzas inspired by the individual personalities of the Ninja Turtles. These specialty pies cost $13.99, and they’re only available online, or if you ask nicely on the phone.
Here they are:
Donatello’s Favorite Pizza: the “brainy” turtle likes grilled white-meat chicken, fresh white mushrooms, crisp green pepper and diced Roma tomatoes on his pie.
Leonardo’s Favorite Pizza: the leader of the gang prefers his pie with sweet red onions, Mediterranean black olives, crisp green peppers and mushrooms.
Michelangelo’s Favorite Pizza: the fun-loving turtle likes seasoned pepperoni, smoked ham, sweet pineapple and spicy jalapeno peppers.
Raphael’s Favorite Pizza: the rascal turtle goes for seasoned pepperoni, natural Italian sausage, hardwood-smoked bacon and crumbled beef.
I had a slice of all four — hey, I’ve got integrity (and I was hungry) — and my vote goes to Donatello and Raphael. I’ve always been a meat ‘n’ pizza guy, but lately I’m digging chicken and ‘shrooms a whole lot.
The Cheesy Bites Pizza and its four Ninja Turtles special editions will be around as long as the movie stays in theaters. I’m not a movie critic, but you might want to put Pizza Hut on speed dial.
Good thing Pizza Hut didn’t create a pizza tied into that “Tammy” movie — the pizza may get pulled on its way to your house.