For the first time, Simply Recipes–a resource for U.S. home cooks with more than 3,000 tested recipes–decided to celebrate “the very best new products to pick up in the freezer aisle”. The Freezies Award awarded nine products that passed a months-long taste test. Italian Genio Della Pizza’s The Bianca won the Best New Frozen Pizza award.
According to Simply Recipes, the U.S. frozen pizza market is valued at over $6 billion and quickly growing. Though still controlled by big food brands, grocery stores are entering this market stocking up on more premium mass-produced frozen pizzas from famous restaurants and pizzaiolos. “Our top pick for best-frozen pizza, Genio Della Pizza’s The Bianca, falls into this category,” Simply Recipes underlines. Anthony Mangieri, the founder of Una Pizza Napoletana in New York, is behind this slow-risen pizza made with all-natural Italian ingredients. The pizzas are made in Northern Italy in wood-fired ovens and are shipped straight to local grocery stores in the U.S.
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Simply Recipes’ testers baked off 15 frozen pizzas. They revealed that “the differences among the pies are astounding and the X factor in the best frozen pizza is the dough. Genio Della Pizza’s sourdough crust is chewy, puffy, salty, and so delicious—it had us grinning ear to ear and taking a mental note to pick up more pies on our next trip to the store.”
THE WINNERS SELECTION
For a product to be considered for The Freezies Awards in 2024, it had to have come out sometime in 2023, and it had to be available nationwide. In the first round of testing, Simply Recipes editors, friends, and family tried almost 200 products within nine different categories and whittled it down to our five favorite products per category. In the second round of testing, they tasked their favorite cookbook authors, food writers, chefs, bakers, registered dietician nutritionists, home cooks, and kids to pick one winner per category. They finally evaluated each product based on taste, texture, quality of ingredients, nutritional value, and overall appeal.