We’re not going to lie: We have a bit of an ugly history with the Healthy Choice brand. We lost a lot of faith in their food when one of their meals started on fire in our microwave. No, we’re not exaggerating; you can read all about it in our review of the Cuban-Inspired Pork Bowl. We got pictures and everything.
But we got over it and cautiously started reviewing their food again. We tried a few more of their products since then, but we do tend to keep them at arm’s length. We don’t want to start any more fires in the Freezer Meal Frenzy office!
But then we saw that Healthy Choice started putting out cauliflower-crust pizza, we knew we had to try it. We love pizza way more than we probably should, and we’re all about checking out the newfangled outside-the-box offerings that are out there these days. So we’re super excited to be checking out the Healthy Choice Turkey Pepperoni Cauliflower Crust Flatbread Pizza today.
Now, let’s get this thing cooked up!
This does come with a crisping tray, which requires a little box-folding. And we have to say, we’ve had some struggles with folding boxes before, but this one was really easy. The perforations are right where they need to be to make the folding process simple instead of requiring a bunch of unconventional tearing.
Once you’ve got the box folded up, just place the pizza on the crisping tray part of the folded box, then stick it in the microwave for two minutes and 15 seconds to two minutes and 45 seconds. We cooked ours for two minutes and 30 seconds, which ended up being the right amount of time. (If you want to read the full cooking instructions for this pizza, check out the package scans at the bottom of this review.)
The crust comes out a bit chewy, but we’re not going to fault Healthy Choice for that too much. This is made out of cauliflower, after all. And it really doesn’t taste bad. But part of that is that there’s so much sauce. The sauce pretty much drowns out all the other flavors here. It’s a decent-tasting sauce — on the sweeter side of the pizza-sauce spectrum — and we love us a real saucy pizza.
The pepperoni is apparently made from turkey, and it lacks that rich flavor of the real stuff. It tastes a little watered down, and it’s also a little rubbery. The weirdest thing of all, though, is how it kind of curls up around the edges as it cooks. That’s not necessarily a bad thing; it’s just weird.
Now, maybe we’re just spoiled from eating Lotzza Motzza and Heggies pizzas, but it’s almost criminal how little cheese this thing has. The pieces of cheese are like tiny islands in a massive ocean of sauce. They’re just here to check a box rather than to make this taste like an actual pizza. And we think that Healthy Choice should maybe reconsider this if they want to be taken seriously in the world of frozen pizzas.
At the same time, this is actually a pretty healthy meal, despite the fact that it’s a pizza. It’s got 350 calories and 580 mg of sodium — both of those numbers look pretty wonderful after some of the indulgent pizzas we’ve been reviewing lately. Then again, this isn’t very filling, and we think you’re going to need a snack to fill up if you bring this to work for lunch.
The Healthy Choice Turkey Pepperoni Cauliflower Crust Flatbread Pizza is pretty mediocre and not very filling. While we appreciate any efforts to make pizza for the gluten-free crowd, this one is a weak attempt at replicating the stuff that frozen food makers like Lean Cuisine (and even Trader Joe’s) are currently successful at. We think that maybe Healthy Choice should go back to the drawing board on this one.
To learn more about the nutrition content, ingredients, or cooking instructions for this gluten-free pizza, check out our package scans below.
