Lean Cuisine Deep Dish Spinach and Mushroom Pizza

August 5, 2008 | Reviewer: Adina

Photo of Lean Cuisine Deep Dish Spinach and Mushroom Pizza Price: $2.50 on sale
Serving: 1 pizza, 6 & 1/8 oz.
Calories: 310
Fat: 10%, 7 g
Cholesterol: 5%, 15 mg
Sodium: 18%, 430 mg
Protein: 17 g
Carbs: 15%, 46 g
Fiber: 18%, 4 g
WW Points: 6 Points

Lean Cuisine says: Spinach and mushroom pizza with a blend of mozzarella, asiago, parmesan and romano cheeses and a creamy alfredo sauce.

Adina says: First off, I went into lunch today craving this Lean Cuisine pizza. I KNOW. The words “crave” and “Lean Cuisine” are rarely used in the same sentence, unless the sentence reads, “I ate a Lean Cuisine meal and then I craved seventeen pounds of chocolate to suppress my post-Lean Cuisine hunger.” But it’s true – I knew it was in the freezer, all cheesy and mild, waiting to be loosely compared to real pizza. And I was looking forward to it. You might say that maybe I’m pregnant or mental, and to that I would reply, SHIT.

Tanya at Iateapie.net thought this was a fairly bad dining experience; however, I disagree. True, the pizza sauce is not red. I find this to be a breath of fresh air. Microwave meal red sauces tend to feature chunky bits of tomatoes that have no taste, as if they genetically altered these tomatoes so that they would metaphorically flip you off every time you took a bite. Instead, this showcases a very mild and I think flavorful alfredo sauce. It is not your typical Italian restaurant alfredo where, when you eat it, you can actually hear your arteries screaming as they drown in the delicious albeit deadly sauce. It is a gentler version, a half sister if you will, of the typical alfredo sauce. It is not necessarily the taste you expect on a pizza, but I find that to be invigorating after 4 hours of listening to the same people complain about the same crap at work.

I am becoming a big fan of the lower fat white cheese blend that I noticed meals are featuring more regularly. I sometimes wonder why I don’t eat a bowl of parmesan for breakfast, considering how flavorful and non-deadly it is compared to the neon orange Kraft singles which often top off my egg and sausage muffin. As for the spinach and mushrooms, well – they are spinach and mushrooms. The upside is…I am eating spinach and mushrooms! And those things have fiber or vitamins or something! Wait…is that…energy I feel? From all the goodness that was my pizza lunch? AMAZING.

I do not know if I would necessarily call this a “deep dish” pizza, as the pizza is a fairly shallow 6 and 1/8 ounce meal. You know what, let me say that again. In caps. SIX AND ONE EIGHTH MEAL. Seriously, LC? Did you hire special marketing consultants who were like “now…saying this meal is 6 ounces isn’t going to get this meal flying off the shelves…but what if we said it was 6 and 1/8th ounces…hmmm, now I think we’re on to something…”

I am not a recent elementary graduate. You can’t trick me with your tiny fractions. I am fully aware that the dish you used to make this meal was not deep. I have not succumbed to your sly marketing tricks. I just like this pizza. It is yummy and white and fairly filling. So just say 6 ounces. I will continue to buy this meal but won’t feel like you are staring at me, clipboard in hand, wondering if I took the 1/8th bait. Seriously, do this again and I will leave a 1/8th pile of crap on your front lawn. And you will inevitably not see it and thus step in it because 1/8th is NOTHING AT ALL.

In the end, I think I just like boring food. I don’t like tastes exploding in my mouth, all LOOK AT ME LOOK AT ME. I like things that are subtle, mild, pleasant. And so if this doesn’t sound like your cup of tea, then I would steer clear. Because this pizza is not exciting. It is tasty, but it won’t sweep you off your feet and take you to Fiji. It will cuddle up with you on the couch and rub your feet while you watch your favorite parts of When Harry Met Sally. This is not a James Bond pizza. This is a Billy Crystal pizza.

So I will give this 3 stars, docking one star for being a fairly boring albeit satisfying meal, and then docking another star for being a condescending bitch.

comments

8 Responses to “Lean Cuisine Deep Dish Spinach and Mushroom Pizza”

bigHEADinc on August 5th, 2008

“So I will give this 3 stars, docking one star for being a fairly boring albeit satisfying meal, and then docking another star for being a condescending bitch.”

Congratulations, this is the best sentence I’ve read in the history of this site.
rob on August 5th, 2008

The cost per ounce of food is pretty high with this one, if they were on sale for half price I could see buying a bunch of them to serve as snacks.

I am almost out of my Kashi pizzas that I loaded up on for the same price as this little thing (Kashi pizza crust is not to everyone’s liking but it is good for you, like eating tree bark).
MaryAnne on August 5th, 2008

Rob, I want to know where you’re located because if I can eat lunch for $2.50, and it not be Ramen, then I’m ecstatic! Half price? If you find these for $1.25, you must let me know. $2.50 seems like a steal to me!
rob on August 5th, 2008

I am in the Tampa Bay area, the dominant grocery chain here, Publix, has things at half price all the time, I try to post them for the benefit of Florida readers.

I try to buy frozen foods when they are on sale and then stock up like crazy.

I still have some Amy’s full size frozen pizzas in the freezer (the spinach ones, I ate through all the pesto ones), they had those at half price, regular price is $5.99, do the math, you get a rather large organic pizza for not much more than you paid for a tiny pizza.

There is no reason to ever pay full price for frozen foods … sooner or later they will be marked down.
Jess on August 6th, 2008

This may well be my favorite review ever. Thanks for a giggle first thing on Wednesday morning. That might just get me through the day (that and the promise of Project Runway tonight). I give you five stars!!
Aubrey on August 13th, 2008

I have one of these at home in my freezer, now I am much more excited to eat it!
Michelle on August 13th, 2008

i love this review! its hilarious!
Danielle on August 15th, 2008

This review was so hilarious that it was all that I remembered when I hit the frozen food aisle recently to stock up on lunches. I just ate said deep dish pizza and found it 2-3 star worthy, as you wrote, but thinking about your review as I wrote it made it even more enjoyable.

If LC hired you to write copy for their boxes, I would probably eat everything you wrote.

I would add to this review that the crisping mechanism was interesting but did not really crisp up the crust. You take the pizza out of the box, tear away the top and fold it so that a crisping shelf is created- and put the pizza on top. Also, the pizza was a bit dry.