Saw you in a way
Beyond figurin' out
These lines of life
have been drawn
and can't be removed
Our eyes is all it took to know
Another Tuesday, another Taste. Well, after sharing a review trilogy of exceptional pizzas on the site earlier this past week... it seems like we couldn't just leave pizza alone for a while on that high note, could we? Nope... wrapping this all up with Return of the Jedi just wasn't good enough apparently... just had to keep it going.
Semi-fortunately for this reviewer and pizza lunatic (I mean 'fan'), this additional entry into this mini-saga was far from the clusterfuckery of Rise of Skywalker (or *shudder* the prequels). Don't get me wrong, this pizza isn't even in the same universe as any of those three I reviewed last week... but I came into this fearing it could've been a whole lot worse.
Panago (according to Wikipedia... Panago's actual site gives no history) appears to have started in the mid-1980s in Abbotsford, British Columbia as a venture of the Rooke brothers. While since establishing a modest presence throughout most of Canada, the majority of their operations are still very centralized in Western Canada (along with about 3/4 of their locations it looks like).
I probably first noticed Panago sometime in the late 2000s (their first Toronto location was apparently at Bay and Gerrard, which I can somehow still visualize on the north side of Gerrard there). Strangely, at this time I never gave them a try despite still living downtown. Oh, this was me waaaay before I worked at Pizzeria Libretto or devised my brilliant Pizza Nova garlic hack, or even had any experience working adjacent to a kitchen... heck I probably still thought Pizza Pizza was okay at this point (oh to be so young and foolish). No, it would be about a decade later that I finally tried Panago's pizza... and the reason I remember this is because it was absolutely terrible.
There is evidence of my thoughts on this at the time! Looking back, I was a bit too harsh on 2-4-1 Pizza in that piece (they're certainly not good, but not worth an 'F'). Pizzaiolo likewise deserves a better re-evaluation than the 'C' I awarded (I'd probably land them a 'B--' now... maybe I was just sick of them back then). As for Panago... they received a 'D' in that review, a review which I wrote shortly after that bad experience. Doubling down on that grade here would mean this is a pizza significantly inferior to the one I had from Wing Machine... which I still regard as one of the worst outlets I've ever willingly thrown money into (dropping it from a high building to watch it float down would have at least been visually something). Anyhow, lets see if or how much Panago recovers here on this re-visit.
One issue that likely happened that first time I tried Panago in 2018: I was grabbing a mini-pizza with just pepperoni on my way to work at Roy Thomson Hall. It probably took longer to bake than I expected or my timing was off... because I have a memory of keeping it untouched and cooling above my locker while rushing out for the pre-shift meeting. By the time I returned (possibly an hour later after setting up a bar and likely training some new person) the pizza was not only cold but totally dried out. Like a mummy. Not even the toaster oven in our break room could salvage it... it was a stale flavourless mess and there weren't even the most microscopic of charms to win me over.
Coming into Panago this time (the very same location on Bremner in fact), I wanted to change it up from my usual topping go-tos. Panago has quite a variety of sauces, ranging from your typical tomato sauce into weirdness like coconut curry, jalapeno white sauce, chipotle cilantro and 'Cheezy Cheddar' (the 'z' really sells it). While curious about these, I wanted to judge their traditional merits as a pizza and so stayed on tomato sauce. However, all these options inspired me towards a topping combination rather unusual for me: steak and red peppers.
First off... I like the generosity of those toppings. There is a good spread of them on here, wherein each bite is almost certain to have something of those two flavours. As for that actual flavour... genuinely not bad. The red peppers are diced fairly small, which isn't ideal to begin with and really works better on nachos or hot dogs (I prefer a firmer crunch on a pizza). When they're this small, these tiny pepper bits dry out very quickly in the oven or on a reheat and you just end up tasting the skin of the pepper, while the rest fades or bleeds out. The steak, however... I was very skeptical this would be anything beyond generic beef strips, unseasoned and blandly cooked to hell. Instead... there's actually a hint of grill-flavour on these pieces, some saltiness and a slight juicy beef aftertaste. Similar to what you might get out of a Medium-Well steak in terms of chewiness and minimal bloodiness. Surely the most pleasant surprise here.
Diving into the basic pizza elements... this is where the curtain gets pulled and Panago veers into a ditch. Double conflicting analogy bonus! Actually... the tomato sauce is rather decent. Not much depth in texture or presence, but at least you can taste it most of the time and it has a light sweetness to it, kind of like the very next step above something generic and forgettable. The cheese likewise is fine... when it isn't overcooked and bubbled to the point of robbing its precious softness.
This Panago pizza is rather like a Domino's pie if it were flatter... there's less of that tasteless overcooked blech throughout simply by there being less pizza here (which is to Panago's credit, for the record). Unfortunately like Domino's, Panago becomes a real slog to eat once cold. Most of the flavour disappears, the cheese gets stiff and after a few bites of tasting nothing and chewing for a century-long minute it becomes time to give up.
Good cheese is important for a pizza to be decent when cold, but most important of all on that avenue is the dough... which sadly is Panago's most glaring flaw. This bread is incredibly bland and unremarkable in every way. There's a hint of a crisp crust layer that you'd get with a likewise pan pizza like Pizza Hut, but where Hut clogs your soul with greasiness... Panago's crust has nothing to it at all. And it desperately needs something, because even as just baked bread it lacks those basic enjoyable flavour and texture qualities. Some salt or dusting of pepper, perhaps? The tiniest drizzle of olive oil? I can now see why Panago likes promoting their bizarre base sauces and various dips. Also... the bottom of these slices are noticeably chewy as well, even when the pie is still warm. It's strange because it doesnt exactly get stale or dry out, rather that the dough itself is tough despite being kinda spongey. Whatever it is, it's bad.
--
Overall... I'd say Panago's biggest shortcoming (the bland, tough dough) would be a shame blocking an otherwise solid pizza. Except, I won't say that! Nah... the bread is very disappointing but even if it were okay, there really isn't anything else here in this pizza that truly impressed me.
At its best... Panago is extremely okay, perhaps one of the most mediocre among the many mediocre pizzas I've encountered. There isn't any one element (beyond that steak, to which I probably just got lucky choosing it) that stands out as notable or distinct about the Panago style. It isn't completely terrible, which means it has improved in standing since my first taste a few years ago... but I wouldn't recommend it either. Even fifteen years ago Toronto had a bundle of better options than this, now there are multiple baskets of far superior quality throughout. Panago gets a 'C', as exact a score as can be for something this 'meh' and quickly forgotten.
Burnt Ends -- Oh my words! I finally get to write this weekly blurb of the review where I update what I've been working on with multiple articles of my work to share. As referenced a zillion times above, here is the Great Pizza Review Trilogy of October 2022: Revolver Pizza Co, the great Descendant, and the newest honour roll kid Bello Pizza.
Inbetween eatin--I mean reviewing pizza, I wrote a baseball thing for BattersBox where I revisited some predictions I wrote back in March for the then upcoming MLB season. Baseball! I'm gonna miss it real bad in about a week or so, like I always do.
Tuesday Tune -- With Halloween having just passed, I wanted a spooky song this week. Plus, after almost seventy of these weekly restaurant chain reviews I've never shared this band I rather love a lot. So here it is:
That's all for this week! I can pretty much guarantee next time we won't be diving into yet another pizza, but hey you never know... Until next time! Stay safe, stay warm and don't spill that mustard.
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