If you want that authentic "DICK THE BIRTHDAY BOY" experience what chain of pizza is closest to the pizza you'd have gotten at Showbiz Pizza? Assuming people can remember well enough.
What pizza is the closest to Showbiz Pizza? -
- Thread starter Dom Cruise
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The best your gonna get is a cum-encrusted Chuck-E-Cheese animatronic in some back alley. The Coof lockdowns have probably gimped that market to death.
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Chuck E Cheese. Showbiz bought CEC and renamed the showbiz restaurants as Chucky Cheese.
Until recently the actual company name was "showbiz pizza" until they officially changed it to Chuck E Cheese around 2018.
The guy who founded CEC helped found Atari, he overexpanded and went into debt and sold out to Showbiz. The guy who founded showbiz was initially an early investor in CEC, got sued, and a percentage of all his profits went to the founder of CEC.
So if you want a showbiz pizza just order carry out from CEC. It's literally the same thing.
Until recently the actual company name was "showbiz pizza" until they officially changed it to Chuck E Cheese around 2018.
The guy who founded CEC helped found Atari, he overexpanded and went into debt and sold out to Showbiz. The guy who founded showbiz was initially an early investor in CEC, got sued, and a percentage of all his profits went to the founder of CEC.
So if you want a showbiz pizza just order carry out from CEC. It's literally the same thing.
You can seriously get carry out from Chuck E Cheese? What’s even the point? Who does that?
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My guess is it's people with kids having a party at home. As far as I know all CEC restaurants offer carry out.
The pizza is only $5 for a large and its quicker and tastes better than little Caesars.
It doesn't look too bad. I might order one just for shits to do a taste test.
Are you talking about the 70s pizza or the 80s+ pizza? I've heard it was better back when they had the bears from Deliverance instead of the giant rat. But nostalgia is like beer goggles.
I imagine any chain pizza will do. They are mostly the same in flavor and quality. Or lack thereof.
I imagine any chain pizza will do. They are mostly the same in flavor and quality. Or lack thereof.
Little Caesar’s is my take. Cheap ass pizza that tastes like someone slopped Alpo dog food and Chef Boyardee sauce on half cooked dough. Sure reminds me of the pizza you’d get from Showbiz or Chuck E Cheese
wunhunglo
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The question is do they molest you or the pizza first. The answer depends on how fat they are. Or how fat you are if they're into inflation kink. You probably have a coin flip chance if you drop the pizza and run away while they swarm like AIDS piranhas.
Bought some, will let you know what I think when I eventually eat it.
I am dead serious when I asked this question, I really want to know what it's like, I have a weird obsession with weird junk food or fast food.
Peak 80s, when Rich Evan's birthday party happened or when you see the commercials featured in the "Rockafire Explosion"
On a side note though, beyond Showbiz if anyone knows what's the best place to get pizza that would have tasted like pizza in general tasted like in the 1980s, I'd love to know.
I actually had Little Caesar’s last year, it was... not great to say the least, Pizza Hut, Dominos and even Papa John's are all better as far as chains go.
I mean I ate it and I did kinda like the bread sticks, but I hate the way Little Caesar’s gets cold fast and when it gets cold it gets a lot worse, not something I plan to get again, which is too bad because that was the first time I ate in 20 years and I remember it being alright as a kid, but of course your tastes change, it's not impossible it did used to be better though?
It's also too bad because brand wise "Little Caesar's" is a great name for a pizza place.
But anyway, if that's what Showbiz or Chuck E Cheese pizza is like maybe I'm on a fool's errand lol.
The thing about pizza though is it's one of those things that's hard to fuck up completely, at least when compared to the worst pizza in the universe, public school cafeteria school pizza, I still can't get over the US government inflicting that on me, we should be tried in the Hague for that crime against humanity.
I kid but it really is fucking cruel that we feed kids that shit, it's (I assume) literal prison quality food, we can do a little better than that for kids.
I used to go to Showbiz Pizza/Chuck E. Cheese a lot as a kid. I know that their sausage pizza tasted similar to the Home Run Inn frozen pizzas (but without the anise and the crust wasn't as crunchy) and if you can find a way to replicate that, then you're pretty much eating the same pizza they served back in the 80s. Little Ceasars would be the closest option to replicate the pizza as well, but they always fuck it up somehow. They tend to skimp on the sauce or the cheese. You're right about it getting cold fast. I live near one and if I'm walking there and back home, which takes less than 10 mins., the pizza always ends up getting lukewarm.
For an authentic experience, put on some Rockafire Explosion songs, make sure to serve yourself that pizza in one of those plastic pizza trays that has small plastic nibs on it and pour yourself a drink in one of those always greasy and somewhat transparent red plastic cups. Chuck E. Cheese is delivering pizza under "Pasqually's Pizza & Wings" for some reason. Fun fact, Pasqually was one of the band members in Munch's Make Believe Band.
For an authentic experience, put on some Rockafire Explosion songs, make sure to serve yourself that pizza in one of those plastic pizza trays that has small plastic nibs on it and pour yourself a drink in one of those always greasy and somewhat transparent red plastic cups. Chuck E. Cheese is delivering pizza under "Pasqually's Pizza & Wings" for some reason. Fun fact, Pasqually was one of the band members in Munch's Make Believe Band.
In general, pizza in the 80s was more tomato/cheese forward. The toppings almost took a back seat. You also generally got less of them. Selection was more limited. Mushrooms were usually canned, not fresh. The crust was usually more bread-y, and many chains (but not so much frozen pizza) prided themselves on nice, big outer crusts, where that seems to have somewhat fallen to the wayside. We weren't nearly as experimental with toppings back in the day, and basically "pizza sauce" meant one thing, and one thing only. Not like now, where Papa John's offers like 17 different equally-awful sauces.
Frozen pizzas were much more likely to have the scattered pepperoni "bits" rather than actual slices. You still see those occasionally on frozen pizzas, but less commonly. There were also a lot of small-label, local/store brand frozen pizzas that were often sold on a white cardboard disk, wrapped in shrink wrap and a small sticker label. Sometimes these would be sold in two or three pizza stacks, for a pretty cheap price. These have almost disappeared in favor of the deli-counter take-and-bakes these days, to the point I'm struggling to even find a representative picture online of the species... They were usually pretty crap, but they would fill you up, and keep kids happy. Basically think a generic, lower-quality version of Tombstone or Jacks pizza today.
As others have said - Little Ceasers. Unlike Dominos and The Hut, which both tout improved crusts/sauces/etc every few years, Little Ceasers is virtually unchanged from the 80s, at least their base pizza.
Another one that's pretty close to 80s pizza still is Hungry Howie's, but they're a smaller chain, you can't find them everywhere - I think they're mostly central US-ish? I'm not really sure.
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Home Run Inn pizza is what I guessed it's probably similar to as Home Run Inn is something I've eaten before and it just kind of gave me that "vibe"
It's been a while since I've eaten Home Run Inn though and I chose Tombstone over it this time, maybe next time I'll try Home Run Inn again.
Even if you get the small thin crust frozen pizzas, never use a microwave to heat it up. Please put it in a toaster oven.
Tostinos is basically this except it has a weird crust that borders on being a cracker. I wouldn't recommend it to OP as a food he should actually enjoy but it's like the food equivalent of the results of ecosystems on isolated pacific islands where insects and birds wound up filling the niche rats filled everywhere else.
Disagree heavily. Totino's doesn't have enough Sause like CEC likes to slather on it and the peperoni bites are what you give to dogs.
I'm offering it as an example of shitty 80s frozen/fresh uncooked grocery store pizza not shitty 80s fresh cooked chain pizza.
I do anytime I want to recreate that AUTHENTIC 1980s bowling alley snack bar experience. (The snack bars at my local bowling alleys served Tombstone exclusively)
Home Run Inn pizza is something I pick up from time to time. Gotta take a trip down the I80 corridor to actually find one to eat at in the wild. But I think Home Run Inn frozen has a unique taste to the crust--not something you'll get if you're looking for CEC or Showbiz. My city once had a Celebration Station--just like CEC and Showbiz. Then the same slot turned into a CEC and has been ever since.
If you want CEC like pizza... maybe Casey's or Noble Roman's?
Also: You can still find Celebration Station: http://www.celebrationstation.com/
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Interestingly, where I grew up, the bowling alley actually had about the best pizza in town. I mean, granted, this is small town, northern midwest 1980s we're talking about, as a metric.
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