Product Review - Crispy Cantaloupe

I was recently offered a sample pack of a new food product, "Crispy Cantaloupe," from Crispy Green, Inc. It's 100% freeze-dried canteloupe, nothing else. That was just too, well ... interesting to pass up, so I accepted.
What can I say? It is in every way what you would expect it to be. These are little dry chunks of dehydrated cantaloupe. When I was a lad, this is what I would've called astronaut food.
These aren't exactly bursting with flavor - cantaloupe is a relatively mild-tasting fruit to begin with - but as they rehydrate in your mouth, a natural cantaloupe flavor does come through.
The texture is difficult to compare to anything other than dehydrated food. It's very light, not dense, dry (though it rapidly rehydrates in your mouth), and more crisp than crunchy. Just to see what would happen, I put one piece in a glass of water. It quickly rehydrated, and the texture became what I can best describe as slippery.
If you're big on visuals where you're food's concerned, this won't do much for you - the chunks, which average about an inch wide or so, look like pale orange bits of styrofoam. But they weren't bad looking, either - there was no "yuk" factor here.
So who would buy these, and why? Well, hikers, campers and backpackers come to mind, although at a mere 40 calories per 10g package, this does not pack the caloric punch of a typical bag of trail mix. The manufacturer recommends them as "a delicious, convenient way to add more fruit to your daily diet," and suggests eating them straight out of the bag, in cereal or yogurt, or as an ingredient in baked goods. I'm not sure I see a lot of reason to use these instead of fresh cantaloupe for those purposes, and despite the eco-friendly sounding "green" moniker, these aren't exactly a locavore's dream - the cantaloupe's from China.
Still, these do have some advantages over fresh fruit. They're lightweight, easily portable, convenient, and healthful, plus they have a long shelf life. Air travelers might like to put a few of these in their carry-on bags, drivers might want to keep a bag or two in the glove compartment, office workers could keep a few in their desks, and parents may prefer this to candy bars in their kids' lunch boxes. So they fill a certain niche, I suppose.
Crispy Green® Crispy Cantaloupe
Nutrition Information for one 10g (0.36 oz.) bag:  40 calories, 0 calories from fat, 14 mg sodium, 9g carbohydrates, 1 g fiber, 7 g sugar, 1 g protein. Vitamin A 8%, Vitamin C 14%, Calcium 1%, Iron 1%. Peanut/tree nut-free, gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan. Product of China.

Joe's Brooklyn Pizza - Beyond the Cheese Slice

When I go to a New York City-style slice joint, I tend to stick to plain cheese slices. Yes, I like other varieties, but in its simplicity, a well-made cheese slice really captures the essence of great New York pizza.
But I also know that man does not live on cheese pizza alone. In fact, if you really want to get down to basics, pizza doesn't have to have cheese at all to be good. What it needs is a good crust and tasty toppings.
You'll find that - in various permutations - at Joe's Brooklyn Pizza in Henrietta. I've been a fan of Joe's since my first visit back in early 2009, not long after it opened (its roots go back well before that, but I won't get into all that here).
Since then, I've tried several varieties of Joe's pizza, and I've yet to run across one I didn't like. So it was with great expectations that I ventured deeper into Joe's menu on my most recent visit, and my optimism was again proved justified.
I've done a few posts about old-fashioned tomato or "sauce" pies, which around here typically are topped with tomato sauce and a generous sprinkling of Romano cheese. Joe's Grandma's pizza fits roughly within that description, but Joe's now offers, in addition, a tomato pie that omits the cheese altogether.
With a blend of tomato sauce, shredded basil, and garlic, all atop Joe's signature, crisp, thin crust, I hardly missed the cheese at all on this one. If given a choice, I'd probably still opt for the Grandma's, most of the time, but it wouldn't be a slam dunk. This was a very tasty pizza - and a great option for vegans, too. Speaking of which, this reminded me in a way of a good vegetarian meal - it might not make you ready to give up meat altogether, but it makes you realize how good a meal can be, even without animal products.
Next up was a Buffalo chicken slice. This is a relatively recent, but to me very interesting style of pizza, as it's subject to so many interpretations.
Joe's version consists of a thin crust, topped with a generous helping of diced chicken, in a tangy, spicy, medium-hot sauce, along with a moderate layer of mozzarella cheese. This was a simple, straightforward approach to a Buffalo chicken pizza, with no blue cheese, celery, or other accompaniments - just chicken, hot sauce, and pizza cheese.
Next to the Buffalo chicken slice in the photo, you'll see a thick-crust, Sicilian version of the Grandma's pie. This had the same blend of tomatoes, herbs, garlic and cheese that's made me such a fan of the thin-crust version, on Joe's thicker, crunchy, pan-baked Sicilian crust. As much as I love thin-crust pizza, the toppings on this one in some ways seemed to go even better with a thicker, breadier crust - kind of like sopping up the sauce from a plate of pasta with a good thick slice of Italian bread.
Speaking of which, Joe's has recently added pasta to its menu, and I tried that as well, compliments of Joe. This consisted of a bowl of fettucine, cooked al dente, which was mixed - not drenched -  with homemade tomato sauce and topped by a sprinkling of grated cheese. The quickly cooked sauce of fresh tomatoes, herbs and olive oil had a bright, vibrant flavor that set it apart from its canned or all-day-on-the-stove cousins, and the only thing I was lacking was the aforementioned slice of bread to soak up what little of the sauce was left in my container.
While that's plenty of food for one visit - or one blog post - I've saved, if not the best, at least the most unusual, for last. If you're feeling just a bit adventurous, or want something a little out of the ordinary, you must try Joe's hot dog pizza. According to Joe (seen proudly showing off a freshly made hot dog pie in the photo), this is something of a cult favorite downstate, and since Noo Yawkas know their hot dogs as well as their pizza, it's a good bet that they're on to something here.
I guess you could call this a white pizza, inasmuch as there was no tomato sauce, though the copious amount of wiener slices and caramelized onions gave it an overall reddish-brown hue. I don't think this would ever be an everyday, go-to kind of pizza for me, but topped with some spicy brown mustard, my hot dog slice was really rather good, and more than just a novelty item. The vinegary mustard (which I added myself) provided a nice counterpoint to the salty, meaty franks and the sweet onions. Next time, I'd love to try one with a bit of warm sauerkraut on top as well.
One of the many great things about pizza is its versatility, as evidenced by the offerings at just this one pizzeria. When all is said and done, I'll still end up going back to my basic cheese slice, but once in a while it's good to mix things up a little, and Joe's offers pleny of opportunities to do that.
I'm not going to give individual ratings to these pizzas. I haven't been rating Buffalo chicken pizza at all, and how can I rate a hot dog pie? My ratings are intended to be guidelines to how a given pizza compares with others like it in this area, and there's nothing around here, that I've tried at least, to compare with this pie.
But I've made clear before that as far as I'm concerned, Joe's Brooklyn Pizza consistently serves up grade-A pizza, and nothing I tried on this visit changed that opinion. If you haven't been there yet, it's high time you did so. When it comes time to pick from among Joe's array of options, though, you're on your own.
Joe's Brooklyn Pizza, 1100 Jefferson Rd # 23B, 14623. 424-JOES (5637)
Mon. - Tue. 11 a.m. - 9 p.m., Wed. - Sat. 11 a.m. - 10 p.m., Sun. noon - 8 p.m.

Product Review: Schwan's Starter Crust

Even if you're not a customer of theirs, you've probably seen Schwan's trucks at some point. Schwan's is a food service company that not only serves commercial clients, but individuals too. They offer a wide array of frozen foods, from entrees to side dishes to dessert, which you order from their catalog or website, and they'll deliver them to your door. I've had some of their food before, and it's not bad.
As you might expect, frozen pizzas are among Schwan's offerings. And while no frozen pizza will ever compare, for my money, with a freshly baked pie using freshly made dough, I don't categorically hate frozen pizza; some of it's not bad, and it might not be a bad idea to have one or two in your freezer, to use in a pinch.
Well now Schwan's is trying something a little different - a frozen "Starter Crust," which is simply a raw pizza crust that's been "fresh frozen" (which seems like an oxymoron, but I know what they mean, I guess) with the idea that you can add your own toppings and bake it in your home oven. I guess the concept is that this gives you more control over the final product, which, in theory at least, will taste more fresh than frozen.
I recently accepted a sample pack for review. This consisted of two 13" crusts, each of which was shrink-wrapped on an individual disposable tray. I baked them on successive days, with a slightly different approach each time.
With both crusts, I found when I removed them from the box that they were cracked right down the middle. This might've happened when I stuck the box in my freezer, because I have a side-by-side refrigerator-freezer, and it was a bit of a tight fit, although I didn't think at the time that I had shoved it in too hard. That wasn't much of an issue with the first pie, though, since the crust nested snugly in the tray, and the whole thing went into the oven.
The crust had a preformed edge that helped hold in the sauce and other toppings, though its machine-stamped appearance detracted a bit from the "homemade" concept. It wasn't so noticeable, though, after I'd spread the sauce around and the pizza came out of the oven.
Following the instructions on the box, I baked the pie at 425 degrees for a little under 20 minutes, going by the appearance of the toppings to decide when to remove it.
What I got was a pizza that was, well, OK. The medium-thick crust was a bit crunchy on the surface, though the crust was not particularly dark. It seemed to be studded with small grain-like particles, which led me to think that it was dusted or made with cornmeal, but cornmeal was not on the list of ingredients. I'm frankly not sure where that crunch came from.
The interior of the crust was a bit dry, and not very bready. It was, well, much like I would expect a frozen crust to be, which is to say, not spectacular. (It's been quite awhile since I had one of the so-called self-rising frozen pizzas, so I'm speaking here of "regular" frozen pizza, which - like this one - doesn't rise in the oven.)
The one area where this pizza was better than a typical frozen pizza was the toppings, which, of course, weren't frozen. One of the problems with frozen pizzas is that the sauce, cheese and other toppings can dry out in the freezer, and baking only dries them out even more. My freshly-added toppings were pretty ordinary -a basic red sauce and shredded mozzarella, plus hand-sliced pepperoni on one side and fresh peppers and onions on the other - but they gave the pie a vibrancy that I wouldn't expect from a typical frozen pizza.
The second time around, I took the crust out of the tray, topped it, and slid it onto preheated oven tiles, with the oven set at 500 degrees.
One problem with this was that because the crust was cracked, I had a little difficulty getting it out of the oven. I ended up taking it out in three pieces and reassembling it outside the oven, with some stray bits of cheese left behind to carbonize on the tiles.
The good news was that the crust was better this time, with a darker bottom that was more crisp, as opposed to simply crunchy, than the tray-baked pie. Otherwise, this pie was very similar to the first one.
So what do I think of the notion of a frozen "starter crust"? Well, these pizzas, overall, tasted like what they were - a compromise between fresh and frozen pizza. Better than the latter, but not as good as the former.
If you ordinarily have the ingredients on hand to top a pizza - sauce, cheese, etc. - it might be worth it to have a couple of these on hand when you want a quick pizza fresh out of the oven. Personally, I'd prefer to make a big batch of pizza dough and freeze some of it, but if you don't feel like going to that trouble, well, this does beat your typical frozen pizza. For what it is, it's not bad, but whether it's worth ordering depends on how much you're willing to sacrifice, pizzawise, for the sake of a little added convenience.
Schwan's Starter Crust, $7.24 for a package of two. www.Schwans.com