The Adventures of Pizza In Japan

Growing up, in the early 2000s, I read a lot about the weirdness of Japan on the internet. The most mundane of things were transformed into something that was weird, wacky, and other-worldly. So the story goes with pizza in Japan.

I remember seeing the pictures of crazy Japanese pizzas topped with corn, mayo, and squid ink. The most surprising part was that these weren’t from local Japanese pizza chains. These were from the big boys: Dominos and Pizza Hut.

At the time, Pizza Hut was devolving from it’s darling status of the 80s into it’s meth-ridden teen phases in the early 2000s. It wasn’t as great as it was before, as cost-cutting measures and stiff competition from the new kid, Papa Johns, took a hit on the chain’s image and taste.

But if anything could spark that 1980s-child-like wonder in us again, it was Pizza Hut Japan. Yeah, the topping seemed weird and out of place on the dinner table, but Japanese Pizza Huts didn’t seem to carry the baggage that the American ones did. So before ever stepping foot into the country, I vowed that I would eat an authentic Japanese pizza from Pizza Hut Japan. Well, fast-forward 18 years, and I finally get my chance.

How Do You Wanna Be Topped?

We opted to go for two kinds of pizzas to try the most amount of topping combinations as possible. You see, in Japan, pizza restaurants always offer pizzas that have 4 different topping combinations on them. And when I say different, I mean different.

The first pizza was called “The Juicy Meat 4”, which kind of sounds like the naughty adult version of the Power Rangers. It came with 4 topping combinations: thick-sliced bacon, BBQ Chicken, the “Just Meat”, and the Korean Bulgogi.

The second pie, titled “Nigiyaka Friends 4”, or “Bustling Friends 4” (stupid name, I know) came topped with cream cheese and tomato; shrimp and bacon; asparagus, pepperoni, and sausage; and beef and potato. Our order also came with a small side of potato wedges, which were free with a coupon.

Honey, I Shrank The Pizza and Blew Up The Price

The first thought that came to mind when the delivery man handed me the pies was, “Wait, we ordered two larges”. Then I remembered that I was living in Japan and that ‘large’ is just a crazy American concept.

The two larges were slightly bigger than an American medium, but were priced like XL pizzas: both coming in at 4,190 yen, which roughly comes out to $42 US. Seriously, these were some pricey -zas, but were they worth it?

Mama Mia That’s-a… Pizza?

First up, I went for the thick-sliced bacon pizza because… bacon. When I bit into it, I was immediately transported to when I was 8 years old, biting into my first Pizza Hut personal pan pizza. That yeasty, sweet dough; the greasy, crispy-fried bottom; it was all there. The taste hasn’t changed a bit, and that’s a good thing.

That thick slice of bacon made a great pairing for the crust. The chewy, salty, meatiness made for a great contrast. The bacon itself was more like Canadian bacon, i.e. ham, but still good nonetheless.

Next, I grabbed a slice of the shrimp and bacon. “Without the pizza element, they make a great pair, so this will definitely be amazing.” Or so I thought. Now, what the name didn’t mention was the fact that the slice was slathered in mayonnaise and “pink shrimp sauce”, whatever that is. Biting into it, I immediately thought Thousand Island Dressing. It had that same creamy, sweet, tanginess as the dressing, but in pizza form. Which is to say, it was pretty bad.

I decided to try to rid the taste out of my mouth with the potato wedges. It looked really good, but biting into it was like taking a fist full of day-old McDonald’s fries and shoving them in my mouth. Cold, soggy, dry, chalky; it was like the potato version of those little Valentine heart candies.

For the third slice, I went for the Korean Bulgogi. The thick cuts of beef looked irresistible, and the taste was hands-down, better than everything else I had so far. The beef was smoky and slightly sweet, and the green onions and sesame seeds gave it a really nice crunch. Strangely enough, it didn’t seem to have any sauce on it, so despite tasting the best, it was a fairly dry slice.

At this point, pizza fatigue was starting to set in. Don’t get me wrong, I have no problems putting down a pizza by myself, but when the toppings are so ‘meh’ compared to a standard deluxe or even a simple pepperoni, it makes it hard to keep going.

Pizza In Japan: A Terrible Decision?

With all of my griping, you’d think that my opinion of Japanese Pizza Huts are in the gutter, but that’s not quite true. Though the topping combinations thus far have been more miss than hit, I can say that the quality of the toppings are the best I’ve ever had on a chain pizza. I mean, it at least needs to have that if you’re paying $24 USD per large pizza.

The fourth slice was BBQ Chicken and onions, topped with mayonnaise. Now some of you may be thinking that mayo and bbq sauce make a terrible combination, but to be honest with you, it was actually a welcome addition. Usually when you have BBQ pizzas, that sweet and tangy sauce doesn’t develop the same flavors as it does when slathered on a piece of meet and allowed to char and caramelize on the grill.

Slather it on a pizza and you usually just have a one-note taste that gets tiring after a few slices. But with the addition of mayonnaise on this, it tempers down the sweet and tangy and takes it from being the main flavor to something a little more subdued and easier to eat in large quantities.

Slice number five was the cream cheese and tomato. Now, cream cheese sounds weird as a pizza topping, but the pairing with ripe tomatoes is genius. The tomatoes were wonderfully fresh and juicy, with just a slight acidic bite. The cream cheese was salty, mellow, and took the edge off of the tart tomato, creating a well-balanced flavor from just two ingredients.

The sixth topping combo was the “Just Meat”, which I’m guessing is the Japanese way to say “Meat Lovers”. It was topped with Italian sausage, pepperoni, ham, bacon, and sliced Japanese sausages, otherwise known as hotdogs. Oh and did I forget to mention mayonnaise? Because there was plenty of that to go around.

Despite a generous squirt of the sandwich condiment on there, it actually tasted like the small pizzas that were served in my high school. They were made by the brand, Tony’s, which I actually quite like. But when you have a $42 pizza that tastes like something you get from a high school cafeteria, there’s something wrong about that.

Topping combo number seven was a medley of pepperoni, bacon, and asparagus. It didn’t seem too strange, though asparagus isn’t a topping that I’m used to seeing back in the U.S. However, it was actually a welcome addition because that fresh, slightly bitter, slightly sweet bite worked so well to cut through the heaviness of the cheese and dough and seemed to give it a freshness that was totally missing from the other pizzas.

By the time I got to the last slice, I could already feel my stomach staging a revolt against me, as it struggled to work through an ungodly amount of greasy dough and cheese. But winners never quit, and I wasn’t about to give up, even with the strange tingling sensation that began to spread from my left arm towards my chest (that’s a good sign, right?).

The final pizza slice was topped with beef and chunks of potato. It looked like the most delicious out of the other seven, so as I usually do with the most delicious looking things, I saved it for last. Boy, was that stupid of me.

Biting into it immediately flooded my mouth an unexpected, candy-like sweetness. Yes, for some reason, some researcher at the Pizza Hut R&D lab thought it was a great idea to make beef taste like an overflowing spoonful of sugar. It completely overpowered all the other ingredients and left me thinking that I had just bitten into a cake that was shaped like delicious savory pizza. Worst topping ever.

The Verdict

If I had to choose one topping combo to rule over all the others, it had to be the asparagus, pepperoni, and sausage only for the simple fact that it wasn’t sweet and wasn’t slathered in mayo. I mean, I don’t mind a little bit of sweet and savory, or the unconventional use of mayo. But Pizza Hut Japan must have thought that those two were a prerequisite for “proper” pizza.

I can imagine one executive on the Pizza Hut Japan board saying in a meeting, “Hey, why don’t we sell this one pizza where it doesn’t have any sugar and mayo?” Then the rest of the members break out into wild, ape-like yelling and disagreement about how that kind of wild idea would never work.

Then the final boss of Pizza Hut Japan, who’s been sitting at the head of the table the whole time, but with his chair back turned to the rest of the group slowly spins around and says, “That’s just so crazy it might work. But if it doesn’t, say goodbye to your wife and kids, Gary.

So would I eat Japanese pizza again? At this point, I can confidently say no. But in two weeks from now? Who knows. Woody Allen once said, “Pizza is a lot like sex. When it’s good, it’s really good. When it’s bad, it’s still pretty good.”, and I agree with him. Japanese pizza, like sex, is still pretty good in the end. Except there’s a lot more mayo involved.

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