Two things can come to mind when somebody says Barbeque Pizza. When I first encountered it I was in a college pizzeria that liked to put hip twists on old ideas. They had a barbeque chicken pizza which had a normal base (crust, tomato sauce, cheese) and then grilled chicken with a zig zag barbeque sauce drizzle. And it was good. And I was happy. And all was right with the world.
I don’t know who’s idea this was, but at some point companies started to replace the tomato sauce with the barbeque sauce. There are a couple valid reasons to use an alternative to tomato sauce. White pizzas were getting more popular and dessert pizzas naturally used chocolate instead. But as with any great moral dilemma of our day, it becomes hard to separate right from wrong in the gray area. I am here to put my foot down and say barbeque sauce is not a gray area- the stuff just isn’t meant to be eaten slathered on bread in those quantities.
My friend told me about a time he went to a pizza place and ordered a shrimp diavolo pie and brought it home. After taking a bite he immediately realized that this was not a normal pizza with added spice. Instead there was no tomato sauce at all- in place of the mild base was nothing other than tabasco sauce! How could this possibly taste good? It didn’t, and my friend threw the pizza away.
Next time you are in the mood for a cute new kind of pizza, make sure the Pizza Sauce Rule is in effect. It is okay to demand tomato sauce instead – I will even go so far as to say that it is your civic duty. Above all, know what you are getting into. As an informed eater, you will only have yourself to blame.